Solipsism
by Laura Harkness
Summary: IF it's true that your mind is the only thing that you know exists, what happens when you can no longer trust what it's telling you? Ten and Jack aim for a "proper adventure" but get more than they bargained for when the TARDIS goes astray... Or does she?
1. Jack: Perchance to Dream

**Solipsism**

_Solipsism: the philosophical idea that "My mind is the only thing that I know exists."_

**Jack: Perchance to Dream**

I don't sleep; I haven't needed to since Rose Tyler did whatever it was she did to me back on Satellite Five. Back in the 2002nd century. Or would that be_ ahead_ in the year 200,100? Whatever… When you're in league with a Time Lord, time becomes squishy. Suffice it to say The Doctor never really explained that whole "rejuvenation" deal as well as I would've liked; although I haven't pressed him hard on it, at least not yet. But ever since then, while I don't sleep, I do go into a kind of maintenance mode every day or two. It's more than resting, but less than slumber – although I am aware of my surroundings and quite lucid, I'm also very relaxed, my breathing and heartbeat slow way down, my eyes close, and my core temperature drops by a couple of degrees. And oh yeah, I dream.

The dreams are out of my control.

I'm not the kind of guy who likes having anything important out of his control. I guess you can say I'm your basic control freak; no news flash there. Because of it I'm not particularly sad to have left that whole need-for-sleep business behind. Face it: sleep isn't very pleasant – you start to feel weak, your body stops functioning normally, you can't stand, the life starts to ooze out of you, and ultimately you lose consciousness – it's pretty disagreeable, especially for people like me. So, right, evading the need to sleep isn't so bad at all.

However, I figure maybe dreaming is a different story – it's necessary – as everybody knows dreams are a mechanism for reinforcing memory pathways. In that respect I'm like all the other humans who have ever been born into this universe.

But I'm a whole lot _unlike_ all those humans who have died. You see, I can't. Can't die, that is. I bruise, I bleed, I break, but I don't die. Not ever. I owe that craziness to the aforementioned Rose Tyler as well. I'm pretty sure this remarkable immortality drives my friend The Doctor bonkers during those rare times when he permits himself to think too much about it, but _c'est la vie_!

So yeah, I do dream. Sometimes my dreams are nightmares. Usually those nightmares are not nearly as scary as many of the real horror stories I've experienced during my life, starting with when I was a small child on the Boeshane Peninsula, and continuing up to the present day. _Especially the present day_. And sometimes they are pleasant, happy dreams. You know, blue skies, fluffy clouds, furry baby bunnies, gentle breezes, the whole nine yards. And sometimes they are deeply erotic.

If I could choose, I'd go with the third kind, no doubt about it. Mixed with a few of the second type, just for variety's sake. I'd prefer to avoid the nightmares altogether, if I could.

But like I said, the dreams are out of my control. And if I get too angsty over them, then, well, maybe I won't drift off into maintenance mode so easily and who knows what sort of mess that would leave me in?

"Perchance to dream," as the saying goes. I figure the dreaming is important, as well as natural. Even the scary dreams that leave me sweating like a pig (and where did that phrase come from I have to wonder) and my heart pounding like a tympani are necessary I suppose. The erotic dreams… well, they serve a particular and very important purpose as well these days. That's because these days, due to my current living arrangement, I'm, um, I guess the word is _celibate_. I'm not sure I'd be able to behave rationally without them – those erotic dreams – or even interact normally. In short, I don't think it'd be possible to do away with my erotic dreams, even if it was desirable to do so.

But_ this_ is something else.

I feel hands caressing my body. The fingers are feather light, cool and exquisitely sensitive. They know just where to touch me, and where to travel next. I am inflamed, nearly adrift from myself.

And it's not just the feel, it's the smell. It is intoxicating like nothing else. I don't need to look or touch. I'm light-headed with the scent. My breath catches and the blood throbbing through my veins is excruciating. I'm aghast at the strength of it. But then I can't help myself… I turn my head and open my eyes…

And I'm alone.

The throbbing becomes a vast pulsing emptiness waiting to be filled.

_Damn._ I roll over and punch the bedding into submission.

Then I close my eyes and an entirely different dream takes hold of me.


	2. Ten: The Two of Us

**Solipsism**

**Ten: The Two of Us**

I'm in the control room fiddling with something or another – well, actually the vortex loop control, which is on the fritz again – when I hear Jack groan.

It's not a good kind of groan.

I walk quickly to his room and listen at the closed door. I hear rustling and then another groan, followed by an alarmed and alarming gasp.

"Jack?" I tap softly on the door with my knuckles. "Are you alright?"

My question is answered by the sound of a very loud impact. It's a bit like a thud, quite reminiscent of a body hitting the floor. I grab the door handle and it moves loosely in my hand, so I open the door, look in, and wait a second for my eyes to adjust to the dim lighting.

Jack is indeed on the floor, ruthlessly ensnared by a blanket. Pillows are scattered here and there around him, and he is looking very sheepish. I suppress a smile, but am only half-successful. I decide then and there to move him into a room with a futon rather than a bed that's several feet off the floor. He'll thank me for it later…

"Jack? What's going on?" I ask. Belatedly I realize I may have intruded on his privacy and so I backpedal, both literally by taking a step backwards and figuratively by inquiring, "Do you mind if I come in?"

Jack is not the same man I first met on mid-twentieth century Earth. But then again I'm not the same Time Lord. I think all things considered the ebb and flow of time has been less kind to my friend the Captain than me. How could it not be? I've lost track of the number of times he's died. I think he probably has, too. He's died way more times than I've regenerated… and from what I've seen, his deaths aren't any less traumatic than my regenerations, although Jack being Jack, he makes them look far easier than they really are. He has, however, described his resuscitations as akin to being dragged across broken glass; I believe he's understating the experience. Not convinced? All you need is to be present when he comes back from the dead. Just look into his eyes in that moment when they first open. You'll see something… I don't even know how to describe it. But it makes me wonder where he goes when he dies. What he _sees_ when he dies. It makes me wonder, but I admit I'm too afraid to ask.

Yes, afraid.

Jack smiles at me – THAT smile – the smile that makes him look like a nine-year-old caught doing something he's not supposed to be doing, and pats the floor invitingly with his hand as he sits up against the bed frame.

Incidentally, he also wraps the blanket more modestly around himself. Imagine that! Jack! Shy! Will wonders never cease? It's not like I've never seen him naked… This time I am more successful at hiding my twinge of amusement.

I walk over, lower myself onto the floor next to him, pull my knees up to my chest with my arms and rest my chin on them. I look at Jack's face, "Another bad dream?" I ask.

He nods his head.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

He shakes his head slowly. Although he's still smiling, I notice the smile no longer reaches his eyes. I have to decide whether or not to let him off the hook.

"Jack?" I guess I decided not to. "I think you should tell me. Talk to me, Jack. Was it Wil again?"

He closes his eyes. "Yeah, I guess so," he says. "It's hard to remember. The dreams vanish so quickly. It's already mostly gone…" His voice trails off but then he opens his eyes again and looks directly into mine. Their startling blueness makes me blink. "And yet it's so hard to forget," he half-whispers.

I know what he's talking about of course. _Who_ he's talking about. We've discussed it often enough. I knew he would have a hard time getting over her, getting over Wil Beinert leaving him and vanishing completely from our universe – vanishing of her own accord – at least that's what we fervently hope: that she disappeared voluntarily. But we really don't know…

I anticipated it was going to be hard, but I'm not sure I realized exactly _how_ hard. I only have my own experiences to measure against, and I've concluded that the level of difficulty for Jack is similar to when Susan Foreman left me… when I had to let Susan go. I still ache from it, you know: I've never gotten over her and never will. I wouldn't want to. That ache is such an important part of my existence. It's an integral part of me. But I've had such a long time to process and incorporate it; I've literally had _lifetimes_ to accept it, and Jack… well for Jack what happened is still so very recent, still so fresh, and it still rubs him raw.

Susan… No one knows, I've never told anyone, but that's when I _really_ started running. I know sometimes, for dramatic effect, I say my running started when I was eight and looked into the Untempered Schism, or when I was exiled by my people from Gallifrey, but in reality it all goes back to Susan and when she walked out of my door forever. I should tell Jack about this, someday… but today is not that day.

Well, running away from despair is as good a palliative as any. Look at me! I'm the perfect example.

"Jack, I wonder if it's time we stop our aimless meanderings and have a proper adventure. What do you think?"

His eyes narrow but he says nothing.

"Remember when you asked me about Dyson spheres? Well, I believe I may have found one in the Time Lord database."

"You've been holding out on me?"

"No! Really, no," I lie. "I just came across it a little while ago. The Time Lords didn't use that term, of course. 'Dyson sphere' is an expression unique to Earth, so it took me a bit of time to track it down."

"Uh-huh."

"So?"

Jack smiles again, and this time it does reach his eyes. It makes me unaccountably happy. "Sounds like fun to me!" he says. The enthusiasm seems real, but me being me, I need to be absolutely certain. Plus, the two of us, we make our decisions together.

"So… does that mean you want to come along?"

He shrugs but there's no mistaking the sparkle in his eyes, "That's what friends are for!"


	3. Jack: A Labor of Love

**Solipsism**

**Jack: A Labor of Love**

After The Doctor leaves I look around for my clothes, then put them on albeit slowly while I take some time to think.

Is it still a lie if the other person knows you're not telling the truth?

Don't get me wrong. Lying is the road to perfidy. Obfuscation, misdirection, dissembling – call it by any name you want – I despise them all. This fact is something you learn unequivocally when you've lived as long as I have: lying is always, always, _always_ bad. I'm not being morally superior here; it's just that lying never, _ever_ works. If you remember anything I tell you, remember that. And yet…

He'd known about the Dyson sphere for awhile, maybe ever since that day outside Sylvia Noble's house when I first brought it up. In reality I do not doubt this for a minute. So what was he waiting for, I wonder. Was he unsure about me or was he unsure about himself or was it something completely unrelated rattling around in his Time Lord brain that caused him to tarry?

And does it really matter?

No, I decide. It doesn't. Or maybe it's that other things matter more.

That wasn't the only untruth told this day. There is another, and this other lie is more egregious. It was far too easy for me to concur that my nightmare had been about Wil. Previously when The Doctor would worriedly and cautiously venture into my room to check on me, the disturbing dreams had always in fact been about Wil's heartbreaking, mysterious, and dare I say sinister disappearance. I'd be sweating buckets and shaking like a leaf, and he'd walk in and talk me down. His words, which sometimes made absolutely no sense whatsoever – that's our Doctor! – weren't as important as his comforting presence, the simple sound of his voice, and the cool, calm touch of his hand.

But this time I lied. Or maybe it was a half-truth. It wasn't Wil of whom I dreamt. That was the lie part. The other part, the part that made it perhaps only a half-lie, is that I am really not sure what the dream was about, but I think… and this is hazy… it almost hurts to remember… I think it was about that freaking psychopath the Master.

It isn't so much that I conjured him – the Master – up in my dream, or that I raised from the dead the bleak days of the year that never was. It's more like the dream was about the interminable horror and despair I felt during those excruciating months when I knew so very, very well what was happening… what was happening to _him_, to my precious Time Lord, and yet could do absolutely _nothing_ about it. It was a time when hopelessness and self-doubt were my constant companions. The darkness of those days seeps back in whenever life is slow, a stain creeping up the walls of my soul. Keeping myself distracted, either through work or fancying myself in love or even being frightened half out of my freaking wits helps me to ignore that darkness.

Being as close to The Doctor as I am now (ah! be careful what you wish for!) has helped to churn up those awful memories, feeding them like bloody chum into my internal dream machine. It's something I'm not sure I'm ready to talk about yet. It's too strange, too new, too private, too painful. For those of us who were present, trapped in that insane, chaotic mayhem, there is no therapy other than the passage of time. A lot of time. And yet if nothing else I know I will _never _allow anything like that to happen to my precious Time Lord again. I came so close to losing him! I've nearly lost him too many times! _Damn it._ He doesn't look after for himself properly, so I know what I must do. It's my job.

But it is a labor of love.

It is effortless, instinctive, natural and habitual.

So I button my shirt cuffs and methodically, with a critical eye, examine my reflection in the mirror. I watch myself nodding my head. I look fine. Just fine. Finer than fine, in fact…

"Jack!" I hear The Doctor hollering from the control room. "Are you coming or are you going to spend the entire day deciding what to wear?"

I watch myself smile. A proper adventure sounds like just the thing.


	4. Ten: Poor Jack

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Poor Jack**

_Poor Jack,_ I say to myself after I leave his room. I sleep but do not dream; he dreams but does not sleep. I suspect he got the short end of the stick, as they are wont to say on that whirling third planet out from Mother Sol. On that marbled world my old "friend" (ha!) Sigmund Freud used to say that bad dreams let the brain learn to gain control over emotions resulting from distressing experiences. No doubt Jack has had enough such experiences to keep his subconscious busy for a long, long time.

Despite their dark side, I must admit that I envy the ability to dream. Sleep has always seemed like such a terrible waste of time to me; why not put it to good use? And while I too have experienced my share of horrors, there are some things… some people that maybe I'd like to dream about. Places and people I miss, for example. But Gallifreyans, as amazing a race as we are, don't possess the dream gene; we weren't programmed with that particular ability.

Dreaming is a curious business, to be sure. Of course many species on Earth are hardwired to dream, not just humans… even Spike dreams! But not me… We Gallifreyans have developed very different psychological mechanisms for consolidating memories and forming internal narratives.

And as for sleep, well… don't get me started. The total suspension of consciousness is inconvenient and tricky, if not downright dangerous sometimes. It sure isn't much of a survival stratagem.

But still, one might wonder how Jack can rest at all these days, beset as he is with bad dreams stemming from all those distressing experiences I mentioned earlier. What happened recently to him back in Cardiff was unimaginably wicked. It still makes me fantastically angry to think of it. Yes… _Poor Jack._ I try my best to get him to talk about his dreams. I believe it is important for him to do so, but admittedly I'm not being entirely altruistic. Jack's dreams reveal things about him that he doesn't divulge in other ways. Important things… Fascinating things… Complicated things… Disquieting things…

And what in the world is he doing in there? It's good the TARDIS has more than one bathroom because I've never known anyone ever who spends more time in front of a mirror than Captain Jack Harkness. And here I'd been thinking that all those good looks came naturally to him. Hah! What you learn about someone when they become your roommate!

"Jack!" I yell at him again. "I'm not getting any younger!" That's a joke of course. And I hear him snicker as his footsteps approach the control room.

He walks in smiling, carrying Spike like a baby in his arms. Have I told you yet how much Jack loves cats? That's another thing I didn't know about him until we became roomies. He positively adores Spike, and anthropomorphizes the blasted animal beyond all rational logic. Honestly, it's disgusting.

"That's a good kitty, a pretty kitty," he's saying as he gazes adoringly into Spike's green eyes. He's using a tone of voice I've never heard him use with anyone else – at least never with me – the quality is somewhere in between baby talk and an intimate whisper.

I roll my eyes. "Jack, you're going to spoil the cat," I admonish him. That's a joke, too. We both spoil the cat ruthlessly. Although it doesn't seem fair: I feed Spike and brush him and clean up his barf and scoop out his kitty boxes but Jack… _Jack_ gets to carry him around like a baby without getting lacerated by the sharp little knives that live at the business end of Spike's paws.

"Aw… he deserves to be spoiled… you should've seen him just now… he's such a good kitty…"

I interrupt him, "Yes, and a pretty kitty, I know. How come you never say such nice things about me?"

Jack allows Spike to drop gracefully to the floor, then looks up and smiles as he holds out his arms toward me, "I dinnae ken, laddie, do ye want me to say nice things about ye?"

The unexpected Scottish brogue causes me to snort loudly through my nose and Jack laughs wholeheartedly in response. Despite the horrible things that happened to him and despite the terrible dreams, he is, it seems, coping magnificently. But would you expect anything else from Captain Jack Harkness?

"So what's on our agenda?" he asks.

I pull out my glasses and put them on. It's show time.

"Whoa!" exclaims Jack, "class is in session!"

I ignore his snarky remark and instead ask Socratically, "Tell me what a Dyson sphere is."

"Well, not that I've ever seen one, mind you, but I believe it is a solid sphere of material enclosing a star, engineered to involve habitation or industrial elements." He shrugs. "At least that's what I think…"

"And you'd be wrong if you did," I point to the console display and he walks over beside me and takes a look. "That's a common misconception. And not that anything is entirely impossible in this universe, but according to the Time Lord Galactic Database, such a construct would be highly impractical and no such shell-like structure has ever been cataloged. What the database describes instead is a system of orbiting solar power satellites or solar sails meant to completely encompass a star and capture most or all of its energy output."

I tap my knuckle on the monitor; it's displaying an image of a cloud of solar satellites and space habitats orbiting in dense formation approximately one AU around a star.

"The purpose of this system would be to meet the energy needs of an extremely technically advanced civilization. Such a civilization would've progressed to the point where it required the _total_ energy output of their star.

"A civilization capable of building and deploying sufficiently advanced spacecraft and satellites in the numbers needed to create a solar system-sized integrated energy-gathering construct would have to be impressive, to say the least. In addition, a system that size of independent gizmos would have to be incredibly smart and self-maintaining."

I take a deep breath and look at Jack wondering if he has any questions…

"A hell of a thing," he manages to mumble. Humph, I maybe expected something a little more intelligent out of him. But then his eyes sparkle and I realize he's pulling my leg. _Again._


	5. Jack: A Proper Adventure

**Solipsism**

**Jack: A Proper Adventure**

My God, he is such an easy target. Seriously, The Doctor is even more gullible than poor clueless Ianto, especially when he's in his full-bore pedagogical mode. It's almost _too_ easy…

And the funniest thing, the _most fun_ thing, is that he's not getting any better at it. It still takes him about two full seconds to figure out I'm screwing with his head. Honestly, I watch for the look of revelation behind those dorky glasses of his and it just doesn't get any faster. Two seconds. That's it. He's hardwired with a two-second BS detection delay. He's such a hoot.

"It sounds like something out of pulp science fiction," I decide it's time to get serious and become a full participant in the discussion, "and scarcely believable. Never mind the solid shell, which I agree would take utterly fantastic amounts of building material…"

"An entire multi-planet solar system of building material…" He interrupts, peering at me over his glasses, which as usual have slipped down on his nose; I resist the urge to use my finger and push them back up.

"Right," I continue, thinking out loud as I work through it. "You'd have to excavate, would that be the right word? _Consume_, I guess, an entire solar system of matériel to come up with sufficient _stuff_ to construct such a shell. And then it'd be vulnerable to all manner of threats such as comets and meteors. And how would you control drift relative to its central star? Obviously such drift could lead to a collision, which would be a very bad thing..."

"Oh, obviously..." The Doctor smiles as he interrupts me, his eyes bright.

I shake my head as much at his silly grin as at the topic at hand. "But even your description of a bubble of satellites seems almost absurd."

"Why?" He's peering at me keenly.

"Well, any such system, whether a solid shell or something less rigid, like your bubble, would inhibit if not totally curtail the light coming from the star…"

"So? That's the whole point," The Doctor shrugs. "To absorb, and re-radiate, all the energy from that star."

"Yeah, I know." Something had been creeping me out there for a second, but I seem to have lost it amidst the overheated academic speculation. I look at him, but there's no help from that direction. He's blinking back at me with his usual inscrutable Time Lord intensity. He's waiting for me to say something clever, _damn it_. I trawl my mind. "I guess it's the megascale level of engineering – stellar engineering – that makes me uncomfortable. To remodel an entire solar system? To dam up the light of a whole star? It's almost incomprehensibly arrogant."

"A bit too much like terraforming maybe?" His brown eyes are suddenly penetrating.

Something clicks. "You're right," I say to him. "It does have that distinct odor, doesn't it? Filling in wetlands, strip-mining mountain plateaus, and chopping down rain forests is bad enough, but altering an entire solar system to suit one's own needs is seriously pretentious. The power and arrogance behind it disturbs me on a very visceral level."

The Doctor softens his gaze, "You're not alone. It intimidates the hell out of me as well, and our experiences with the Terraformers don't make it any easier to contemplate. The Time Lords, from what I can tell, purposefully chose to stay away from such stellar engineers – that's a good term, by the way! – and there may be good reason for it. Or maybe not… My people tended to be incurious about and easily threatened by those few civilizations they perceived as more advanced and/or more intelligent."

I nod; I'm not sure what else to say at this point because it feels like The Doctor is weighing something important in his mind. I've learned that during times like this he wouldn't hear me even if I did speak. I'm not one hundred percent certain he'd hear a bomb if it went off right next to his head. So I just watch him. It still amazes me to be so fortunate to even be able to say those four words: _I just watch him. _I wonder if it will ever stop amazing me.

Or if I will ever become accustomed to it; I pray not. I think about all those centuries I searched for him, all those decades I waited for him. During those dark years I would often fantasize what it would be like to find him: first I'd kiss him _and then _I'd kill him; that's how extreme and powerful my feelings were for The Doctor. When I finally did manage to find him, it seemed for the longest time like he was either always running away from me, or I was always running away from him.

But now that's all changed – and I don't want what I've finally found to ever end.

He's off somewhere else for a few moments, staring into space, and then he tilts his head and smiles wickedly in my direction, "Seems to me if the Time Lords stayed clear of them, that gives us all the more reason to go knocking on the sphere builders' door! What do you think?"

I shrug, "Didn't I hear you say something about a _proper_ adventure?"

"Oh yes!" His eyes light up and I feel a thrill run up and down the skin in the small of my back. Or is it a chill? Whatever, I love it when he gets that look on his face.


	6. Ten: Randomness Factor

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Randomness Factor**

Jack has traveled enough with me to know that I do and at the same time I do not have much control in directing the TARDIS. Some of my regenerations were better at driving than others, and right now I'd say I'm on the plus side of the piloting spectrum. I feel quite confident in my abilities but I've learned there is a randomness factor involved.

I set the coordinates displayed in the Time Lord Galactic Database for the Dyson sphere located in the Callisto system of the Pergamum galaxy. Jack already knows how to fly the TARDIS; he figured it out on his own long ago – clever man that he is – back when he installed the tribophysical waveform macro kinetic extrapolator, back when Rose Tyler was still my companion, and he was merely a hanger-on, a sycophant, a groupie. He's picked up a few more driving tricks since we've been traveling together, and now all I need to do is nod at him and he hits the switch to open the time vortex.

As soon as he does, I know something is wrong.

I glance at him and I can tell from the look on his face that he, too, realizes that something isn't right. It's not a sound, per se, that's the indicator, or the way something looks, or even a specific sensation, it's a gut feeling the old girl opts to share with me. I'm of two minds that she's evidently decided to share this same intimate knowledge with Jack, but I don't have time to obsess about it, or to be jealous. Or even make a snide remark. _Pity…_

"Jack!" I scream, mid-lurch, as I reach over and try to grab the handbrake. "Close the vortex and activate the dimensional stabilizer!"

The Captain moves faster and with more self-assurance than I could hope for. But he isn't fast enough. Nor am I with the handbrake. We're already much too late to take any effective action, and this I also know from the TARDIS telepathic circuits. To my dismay and distress, I discover what has happened is not an accident, it is intentional. _Someone_ is taking us _somewhere_.

And I'd wager this _somewhere_ of which I speak is not the Dyson sphere in the Callisto system of the Pergamum galaxy.

There's nothing we can do but hold on. I watch the ship's central column move up and down and mutter a few choice Gallifreyan expletives under my breath. Then I catch Jack looking at me and I shut my mouth. Teaching the Captain Gallifreyan is something I'd definitely had in mind, but starting with profanities probably isn't the best way to go about it. Or maybe considering Jack, it is…

"Do you know what's happening?" he asks, quite reasonably and despite the racket of the engines.

I shake my head, "I know nothing more than you. It would appear we're being hijacked." I shift closer to the display screen, but there's nothing useful rendering there, at least not yet. I look at Jack and try to smile, "I did promise you an adventure, but this isn't exactly what I had in mind."

He grins back at me and manages to give a little shrug, even though he's firmly anchored himself via his arms to the console in order to stop from being tossed about the control room like a leaf in a windstorm. "I'm not picky," he shouts over the din. "But it'd be nice to know what to expect when we finally get to where we're going!"

"Truer words have…" I begin to say, but then I'm interrupted from continuing my statement because I feel the TARDIS engines cutting back. I notice Jack is already activating the force shield; something I wouldn't have necessarily thought of, but his devious mind is clearly thinking along more sinister lines than mine.

The TARDIS finally stops and data are streaming across the system monitor. Jack is suddenly standing next to me and he remarks grimly, "I'll be happy as long as we're not at the beginning of the universe. Or at its end…"

I wish I could promise him we weren't.

But it's too soon to know. I _can_ tell that the TARDIS has not landed on solid ground. Instead I think, and I believe I'm correct about this, she is suspended in space.

But where?

And when?


	7. Jack: Surprising Things

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Surprising Things**

The TARDIS engines slow and then stop. Thank goodness for the relative quiet: I can think again; I can breathe again. And thank GOD that I managed to avoid getting thrown to the floor. I smile inwardly and congratulate myself, daring to believe that I've finally gotten my sea legs. You see, I've spent more than my fair share of time splayed flat out on my back on the TARDIS control room's grating. And not for any good reason, mind you.

The Doctor is staring at his console monitor and grumbling something under his breath. I wonder if he knows how much he talks to himself? Probably not, I decide. I find the habit extremely endearing, but there are times, like now, I wish I knew what he was saying. And thinking. One of the surprising things I've learned recently is that the TARDIS translation circuit doesn't translate Gallifreyan – neither spoken nor written.

I squint at the display and all I see are those madly intriguing Gallifreyan symbols: screens and screens and screens of them. Rose Tyler told me once that she was able to understand these most curious of pictograms. It wasn't that she actually literally and formally learned the language, she said, but rather according to her it happened through something like osmosis. I figure it's the TARDIS herself, worming her way into our minds. For sure the process is gradual and nearly imperceptible, and I am quite convinced it has already started inside me. If it was any other alien entity I'd be outraged and pissed as hell. But the TARDIS? She can do whatever she wants with me. _Mmm, just like her Time Lord…_

"I need to look outside," I say suddenly to The Doctor. And believe me when I tell you I don't know why I said that. I'd been thinking something else just then. Something totally different. In fact, something more than a little bit naughty…

He takes off his glasses and looks closely at me. "What?" He's got a strange expression on his face.

I glance over my shoulder at the doors and then look back at him. "I need to see outside – really see, like with-my-own-two-eyes see. I need…" I check the force field to make sure it is still active. "We need to open the doors, Doctor."

He's still standing there staring at me. I feel like I have an itch that I can't scratch.

"Doctor, I'm serious!"

He puts his hand on my shoulder. "Jack, I know. I know you are," he says softly. "I'm just trying to understand what's going on. Where's this coming from?"

"I don't know! I don't know what's going on or where it is coming from! I just know what I'm feeling and I feel that I need to look outside. There's no harm in it, is there?" I motion toward the force field control. "I mean nothing can possibly hurt us, can it?"

The Doctor shakes his head, but then he shrugs, "Well, yeah, sure, a lot of things could possibly hurt us. There's a whole universe of things that could bash, smash or soundly thump us. Still, if you need to look outside, we'll look outside."

He types something on the keyboard and inspects the display monitor again. He types something else then steps away from the console and winks at me. "Come on," he says, "what are you waiting for?"

I follow him down the ramp. At the entrance he steps back and executes a gallant bow in my direction. "_Apprez-vous mon Capitan_," he says in impeccable _Français_.

"_Merci beaucoup_," I respond with my clumsy American accent as I unlock and, with no small amount of trepidation I must admit, throw open the doors.

Our eyes are met with the unmistakable blackness of outer space. Really, there's nothing else in the universe like it: perfect darkness interspersed with the pinpricks of stars and galaxies far, far off in the distance.

But there's something else, too. As my eyes adjust I see an improbable shadow floating against the starscape. I stare at it, blink a couple of times, stare again and realize it is a ship-shaped shadow, floating almost indiscernibly, barely visible against the cold darkness of space. Unbelievable and yet it is definitely there. Definitely real… Definitely… Definitely…

I reach for The Doctor's hand. I find it and squeeze it hard. It squeezes back.

"Oh my God," I whisper. "It's the Newhope."


	8. Ten: Not Lying

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Not Lying**

I run back up to the console. I'd been trying to figure out where we were. _When_ we were… I hadn't thought about looking for space ships. Much less derelict, _dead_ Time Agency space ships. It had never occurred to me, honest.

Of course Jack is correct. It's the Newhope. There's no doubt. She's positively identified on the bloody display monitor sitting in front of me. But I knew it without the ephemeral symbols on the screen telling me; I knew it as soon as Jack said it. I could feel the trueness of it in the way the pulse raced in his hand as he uttered the fateful words. I want to hit the monitor, smash it to bits, but I suppress the impulse; that kind of behavior is so definitely _not_ this regeneration. Now the last one – yeah – he wouldn't have hesitated, back before he met Rose Tyler, to break it into tiny, satisfying fragments. But not me. Instead I glare at it, as if my icy stare could somehow make what I'm seeing not correct. Make it go away. Make it untrue.

Derelict… Dead… I don't want to think about what that implies. There's no time to think about it now anyway. Instead I need to focus on what we must do next. But that's easier said than done. My eyes involuntarily track up and back to Jack, who is still standing at the entrance, looking out. His posture, his shoulders betray his misery-filled emotions. If you think about it, he's actually Co-Captain of that derelict, dead ship; Co-Captain along with his – what? – friend, colleague, lover, partner-in-crime, maybe even occasionally his rival, John Hart.

When we last saw the Newhope she was a happy ship, filled with optimism and light, warmth and life. We left her, in another galaxy, in another time, in the capable hands of Captain John Hart and my friend and all-too-brief companion, Varna Aden Timmochan. Now, according to my display the Newhope's temperature is barely above the ambient temperature of the space surrounding her – roughly three degrees Kelvin. She appears to be generating no significant EM or any other sort of radiation. Need I add that she is not under power? Nor are there any life signs being detected aboard her.

I look at Jack again. "Jack!" I yell. I suddenly wonder why my thinking is so negative, so dismal. A derelict ship, yes, but it doesn't necessarily mean that John and Varna are not alright. I notice Jack hasn't reacted to the sound of my voice, hasn't moved. The existence of a ship adrift, I tell myself, doesn't necessarily imply that something terrible has happened. I know it sounds like I'm reaching, but it's true.

"Jack!!" I yell again. This time more loudly. Still he doesn't move. It's not like me – or him! – to automatically jump to a wild conclusion like this. We need to investigate, acquire solid data, ascertain firm facts. We need to rationally, methodically, and carefully determine what happened to the T.A.S.S. Newhope and her crew. We have a mystery to solve, not bodies to bury.

"JACK!!!" I bellow.

"WHAT??" He spins round and glares at me with piercing blue eyes. His face is a study in all the most horrific of human emotions: fear, hatred, anger, dread, terror, despair…

"Jack," I repeat softly, "please close and lock the doors and come back down here. We have work to do."

"What work?" he looks at me fiercely and frowns. "What could we possibly do about _that_?"

"Jack, you're making assumptions," I admonish him; try to rekindle some small spark of hope in his aching heart. "I know better than that… YOU know better than that. There's plenty we can do, but I need you with me, standing next to me, not grieving for something that may or may not be real. _Please_ Jack…"

I'm not lying, I realize. I do need him. I need him standing beside me. I need his strength and I need his intellect. I need his fortitude and courage. I don't want to do this, whatever "this" is, alone. _I need him._


	9. Jack: Two Seconds

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Two Seconds**

Isn't that just great? He needs me.

The Time Lord needs me.

I am needed.

Oh joy.

Pardon me while I fall apart. All I want right now is to be left alone. Is a little privacy too much to ask? I want to be left alone with my bleak, existential despair. Just the two of us: my despair and me. Is there any doubt I've earned it? Come on… don't I deserve a little slack here?

I know I ought to be kicking and screaming, fighting whatever it is we're up against. But, again, let's be honest, is there any doubt we're up against _something_, and that this _something_ isn't good? And why the hell is that? Can you tell me? Why does it always have to be not good? Is the universe really this unfair? It makes me want to howl like a rabid wolf.

I look at his face and recall that when I first met him I was a vapidly happy fifty-first century lying cheating sex-addicted con man. Since then, well… do I need to enumerate it for you? I was turned into a hero against my will, I was killed, and then I was dragged back to life and left forsaken, intentionally abandoned – left behind – on the killing fields of Satellite Five. After that, well, after that it all went steadily downhill – ultimately the whole ball of wax being topped off with my having to become celibate. Talk about insult being added to injury…

Thanks to The Doctor I have developed, among other "admirable" traits, a shred of empathy… and did you know? Despair is empathy's best friend. Right now I long to be permitted to wallow in my despair, but that look on his face… I know that look. I know he's not going to allow me to wallow. This is a wallow-free zone. I hate him for it. And I love him for it. I love him because I know he's right.

Speaking of… The Doctor is watching me. "Jack," he says quietly, his eyes filled with kindness and concern, "I don't expect you to be an unfeeling automaton. I don't _want _you to be an unfeeling automaton. But the game's afoot; we dance at dawn. There will be time for other things later, but right now we do indeed have work to do. We need to figure out how to get onto the Newhope, and that's just for starters." I notice the tone of his voice is changing, becoming cooler and more serious. "My question to you, Jack, what I need to know is, are you going to Call or are you going to Fold?"

I slowly close and lock the doors and then turn back to face him. "Are we going to play _Texas hold 'em_ or are we going out dancing?" I smile wanly. "Because if I have a choice…" It occurs to me I've been slouching as well as wallowing, so I pull myself up to my full height as I walk to him, "…between poker and clubbing, well, I'd probably choose the latter unless I can make a slight alteration to the variant of poker?" By now I'm in his face and grinning as wickedly as I can manage.

He shakes his head grimly but I can see that his eyes are smiling. "Are you done feeling sorry for yourself?" he asks.

Whoa. Okay. Well. "Yeah," I answer, still looking into his eyes, which I think are smiling, _aren't they?_ "At least for the time being..." Yikes, maybe they're not smiling. "B-but I reserve the right…" I hiccup.

After a long, uncomfortable moment The Doctor smiles sardonically and winks, "That was _at least_ two seconds," he says snarkily.

I take a step back and mutter, "What is this, a competition?"

"What else could it possibly be?" he responds.


	10. Ten: Drifting in the Darkness

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Drifting in the Darkness**

"What are we going to do?" Jack asks me.

I answer him more petulantly than I should, "Ask me something I already know."

Jack raises his eyebrows and I immediately regret snapping at him. He'll get over it, though.

"Okay, how about," he proceeds, "where are we?"

I nod and motion for him to look at the display monitor. "We're in an unnamed solar system of the Eris galaxy. Eris is quite distant, respectively speaking; it does not lie within the Milky Way's Local Group. We're at present located outside the system's Kuiper belt, and the Newhope is drifting in the darkness beyond the frosty edges of planetary space. Her orbit, and she actually _is _in orbit around the system's dwarf brown star, is steeply inclined, almost forty-five degrees above the plane in which the planets and dwarf planets orbit."

I scrutinize the Captain worriedly. I am consciously speaking in cold, dispassionate academese. I'm doing it for me, you understand – I'm trying the best way I know how to keep my emotions at bay – but I'm fairly certain that Jack isn't going to like what I'm saying, nor is he going to like the way I'm saying it. I wait patiently for him to respond. I can tell that mentally he's working very hard right now.

One never knows how Jack Harkness is going to react. That's one of his attractions – one of the things I find so appealing about him. He's exciting – even to me – and as many times as I've been around the old cosmic block my excitement threshold is pretty damned high. Why walk when you can run? But the volatility can be a liability, too. There is always a hidden danger lurking there in his unpredictability.

"What would she be doing out here?" he finally asks.

I withstand the desire to make another snide remark about questions to which I have no answers. Instead I offer a reflection, "Its attributes make it an ideal place for those who don't want anything to do with the inner system, or who want to do something spectacularly dangerous, or who want to commit some sort of crime, or who just don't want to be seen or bothered. There's nothing out this far other than your random, boring dwarf planet composed primarily of frozen-solid methane lakes. In other words…"

"In other words," he says, "it's not a very friendly or hospitable place, but it's remote."

I nod silently.

"Okay, having established that," he goes on, "_when_ are we?"

"According to the TARDIS, our relative position in the timescape hasn't changed significantly. Well… apart from the amount of time it took us to get here, which is negligible."

Jack smiles thinly at me. "Do you know," he asks, "if the TARDIS had anything to do with bringing the Newhope to this location? As I recall, when we left John and Varna the two ships had come to some sort of agreement, or arrangement, on eventually returning the Newhope and John back to their proper time when the crew's tasks were completed."

I feel a flush of anger at the insinuation. "_That_," I motion toward the doors, "is not my ship's doing."

"Doctor," Jack interrupts me, "that isn't what I'm implying." Then he shakes his head and frowns, "But maybe I am. Look, I don't know what I'm saying here. It's just I'm wondering, generally speaking mind you, if the TARDIS has anything at all to do with any of this."

I'd actually been wondering the same thing myself. "I'm not sure. The old girl is strangely quiescent right now. I'm sure you sense it too. It's possible she brought us here because she knew what we'd find. But I don't know that. There's nothing to empirically prove it either way. Not to belittle the question, because it is interesting to be sure, but I suspect we have more important mysteries to solve than what the TARDIS does or doesn't know, and why at present she's not talking much."

Jack strokes the console with his fingertips, "Maybe she's just sad?"

I nod glumly. At first I merely think it to myself, but then I say it out loud, "There seems to be a lot of that going around at the moment."


	11. Jack: Space Monsters

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Space Monsters**

We're in an offshoot of The Doctor's wardrobe. He's let me rummage around in his closet before – in fact I spent several days here just gawking. A costume in any size for any epoch, that's what I discovered. My inner child was enchanted. It is a whole pile of fun.

But I'd not seen this area before. It's not fun at all. To my dismay and horror it houses a large selection of EVA suits.

"Oh no," I groan. "Are you going to make me wear one of those?"

"Yep."

"And a helmet?"

"Yep."

"I hate spacesuits," I'm whining and I can't help it. "And I hate space helmets. They do terrible things to my hair."

The Doctor snickers. "Jack, they're kind of required attire for where we're going."

"But… but can't the TARDIS somehow shield us? I mean, she has a chameleon circuit and telepathic circuits and a translation circuit and gods know what other circuits. But you're telling me she has no way to enclose us in some sort of protective life support bubble?"

This causes him to laugh out loud. Humor was not my intention here, not even my secondary goal. His laughing makes me all the more annoyed. I'm absolutely sincere: I detest EVA suits. They are a whole different pile of no fun at all.

"Jack, what are you nattering on about?"

"I'm serious! Being incased in one of those damn things…" I point to one that looks like some sort of god-awful NASA moon suit, "…is _not_ something I enjoy. I'm… I'm…"

"Yes, Jack?"

"I'm claustrophobic!"

"WHAT?!"

"Well, not like certifiably or clinically claustrophobic, but I don't do well in those things. I suck air…"

"Not a problem." I can tell he's trying not to laugh.

"I sweat a lot. I get over-heated…"

"Won't be an issue."

"I'm clumsy. I run into things…"

"It's going to be okay Jack."

"I get hungry. I get thirsty. I feel like I need to go to the bathroom all the time…"

"Jack?" He stares at me. He's still amused but maybe not-so-much.

"What?"

"The TARDIS doesn't have a protective life support bubble circuit."

"Oh. Well what about…"

"No."

"Or the, a…"

"No."

"Right," I know I've lost the battle. "So we're going to EVA?"

"Yes!" he says cheerily. "And I'm sure we've got the perfect suit for you. Maybe something from the early Soyuz years of the Soviet space program?"

I roll my eyes and groan.

"Oh Jack, I'm just joking. We have state-of-the-art equipment here on the TARDIS, you know that…"

I visualize the ship's console with all its thrown-together bits of junk and can't help but chuckle.

"Seriously, We've got smart spacesuits you'll hardly know you're wearing, Jack. They include rebreathers that provide unlimited air. All your bodily functions will be dealt with, uh, efficiently and elegantly. It'll be like a second skin. But more to the point, the suit will keep you alive over there on the Newhope. At least until we get the ship's life support working…"

"Hostile environment?" I interrupt him.

"Oh, very."

"Do you have any armored combat suits?"

He stares at me blankly.

"Doctor, do any of these suits incorporate _weapons_?"

He shoots me another empty look.

Sometimes it's like we just stop connecting. It's the weirdest frickin' thing.

"Space monsters?" I raise my eyebrows questioningly.

The Doctor shakes his head. "I don't think so. Nothing could be alive over there. It's basically deep space vacuum in a can inside that ship."

"All the more reason we should be weaponed up," I insist.

He turns his back toward me and methodically begins scanning his collection of EVA suits. But I'm not sure he's not turned away from me because he's disappointed. We basically have very different attitudes about violence, and we both know it's always going to be a sore point between us. We will have to agree to disagree: an irresistible force meeting an immovable object. I'll let you decide which of us is irresistible and which of us is immovable.

I'm willing to accept our differences and continue to respect him. I wonder if he is willing to do the same for me.


	12. Ten: A Good Strong Wallop on the Head

**Solipsism**

**Ten: A Good Strong Wallop on the Head**

I didn't like Jack Harkness much when I met him on the planet Earth in January 1941.

Of course it didn't help that he'd been openly flirting with Rose, but mostly what bothered me about him was his violent and criminal nature.

Don't get me wrong, although I try to set an example I'm not in the business of defining or enforcing morality. But there's right and wrong, good and bad, and clearly Captain Jack Harkness, 51st century Time Agent and World War II American volunteer with Number 133 Squadron RAF, was unquestionably on the wrong, aka: bad, side of the ethics tracks.

But that was then and this is now.

I take a deep breath, turn around and face Jack.

"The number of offensive weapons on the TARDIS is extremely limited," I tell him although he is well aware of it already. "In fact, it's null. Aside from the ones you've snuck on board," Jack widens his eyes in surprise but I continue, "that applies to the spacesuits as well. There are no _Space Troopers_ armored combat suits, unless you also spirited one of those aboard?"

Jack silently shakes his head in response.

"I don't want to change you or hold you back, Jack. But I am in essence a peaceable and peaceful creature. That being said, your gut instincts have saved my 'skinny butt' as you've called it more than once, and I don't deny that your fiercer nature serves a purpose. But…"

"But you want me to cool it," he interrupts me, just like I hoped he would.

You see, I'm trying to make a point. I'm not even sure, to be honest, what point I am in fact trying to make until it actually comes out of my mouth, that's the kind of gob I've got, but trust me, that doesn't make what I have to say any less valid.

"No, Jack, I want to maintain my self-integrity but I also want you – the both of us – to stay alive. If you believe we're going into a dangerous situation, then we need to talk about it and decide what to do.

"So… I ask you: do your gut instincts indicate it's dangerous on the Newhope?"

He nods his head several times and then, inexplicably, he says, "No."

I pull a face at the verbal/non-verbal disconnect, nod my head back at him and say, "What do you mean _no_?"

"I mean _no_, I don't have any logical reason to suspect it is tactically dangerous over on the Newhope," he responds. "But… but I'm nodding my head because I believe I'm suddenly and unexpectedly realizing that you value what I think and what I say, Doctor. And I must admit, I guess I'm pleasantly surprised."

And believe it or not, I actually see tears welling up in Jack's eyes.

Now it's my turn to unexpectedly realize something.

"Oh Jack, of course I value what you think and say. I value your heart and your mind and your body and your soul. I value your strength, courage, and fortitude. I value your judgment. I value your intelligence. I value your fairness. I value your faithfulness. I value your compassion. I value your curiosity. I value your resolve. I even value your sense of humor, Jack. The fact that you are here with me on this ship by definition should tell you that I appreciate, respect and admire you."

He's looking at me with those dazzling blue eyes of his and I can't shut up.

"I may not always agree with you, but I will always listen to you and I will always be ready to accept and defer to your judgment, if that's what needs to happen."

Suddenly I break out into a smile, I can't help it. "Of course to get me to defer to your judgment, you may, on occasion have give me a good strong wallop on the head."

I force myself to stop blabbering and wait. I wait for good long while.

"Wow," Jack finally exclaims. "Where did all that come from?"

"Probably the same place your abrupt and extreme bout of insecurity came from."

"Oh, right," he says sheepishly.

"Doesn't mean what I said isn't true," I add. "Nor does it mean that everything isn't still a competition…"

"Game on." Jack responds, almost but not quite under his breath.


	13. Jack: Both Broken and Whole

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Both Broken and Whole**

The Doctor I used to know – the one who looked like a U-Boat Captain – had a specific verbal style, a certain _je ne sais quoi_ when it came to language. To be blunt, while he could charm the rattles off a rattlesnake, he could if the occasion warranted it say the meanest, cruelest, nastiest things. The current Doctor, the spiky-haired guy in the grungy Converses, still talks the talk but nevertheless is a lot more subtle, to be sure. _Even when he's being rude._

But U-Boat Captain Doctor's words would often cut like a knife. I frequently heard him refer to humans as "stupid apes" and he'd constantly disparage poor Mickey Smith, Rose Tyler's beleaguered ex-boyfriend, as "Mickey the Idiot." I also heard him once vehemently belittle twentieth century Earth astronauts with the astonishing phrase "canned primates" – and that phrase sums up _perfectly_ what I feel like right now. I am a "canned primate" trapped inside a pneumatically sealed spacesuit.

Supposedly, according to The Doctor, it is a highly intelligent one-size-fits-all bleeding-edge spacesuit which adjusts automatically to perfectly fit its occupant. But I'm not so sure about that. It seems to be binding in places where I'm especially sensitive to such binding; if you get my drift. A small, tiny part of my brain can't help but wonder if the Time Lord arranged for this on purpose, somehow, just to keep me a little uncomfortable. I shrug off the suspicion as I watch him make final adjustments to his own, identical spacesuit.

He was spot on – the technology in the suits is amazing. There's no doubt about it. If we had to, we could live in them and be adequately sustained for days if not weeks. And as The Doctor claimed, all of our basic physical needs are taken care of. But even more interesting and maybe more important as well, to me at least, is they have a brilliantly advanced medical capability. They can if necessary inject anesthetics, blood plasma and sophisticated medibot tech to help keep the suit's resident alive if he or she is injured or incapacitated.

In addition – of all things – the gloves are even more stupefyingly advanced. They are neural-network-based multi-sensory gloves. Anything you touch with them feels exactly as if you were touching it without the gloves. Your somatosensory system is not at all inhibited by these wonders of technology; thermoreceptors, mechanoreceptors and chemoreceptors talk directly with the gloves' neural-net. In fact, in the true almost metaphysical sense of the phrase, they become one with the wearer. Your dexterity is if anything enhanced because while it feels like you're not wearing gloves at all, you are in fact instantaneously and totally protected from any harm if the need arises. Elegant and extremely fine-tuned, they are truly astonishing.

The helmet has a sophisticated HUD, which frankly I expected but nevertheless is beyond anything I've ever encountered in the past. I've worked extensively with head-up displays before so I don't have much of a problem adjusting to wearing one, but this one... This one has a new twist, as it has the capacity not only to display data on the inside of the visor, but it can project that same information, _and more_, directly onto my retinas with a low-powered laser. Now that's cool tech.

But in the end they are still spacesuits, and my scalp is already starting to itch and I can distinctly hear my breathing, and it is _way_ louder than I'd like it to be. I sound like Darth Vader.

The Doctor was also correct about the spacesuits not having any built-in offensive weaponry. I can't explain it, but this makes me nervous, and the fact that I feel that way makes me feel guilty, and the guilt makes me paranoid… It is a never-ending downward spiral. What a mess… there are times it seems that I am both broken and whole and this is one of those times. I don't understand why I feel naked without a weapon and I find myself frantically wondering if I have time… if I can somehow…

"Jack," The Doctor interrupts my thinking. He's speaking to me through the com in my helmet and I see a small image, a little two-dimensional picture really, of his face in a corner of the HUD. "Are you ready?"

"Doctor?" I say.

"What is it Jack?"

His words dangle above me like a hangman's noose. I involuntarily gulp a ragged breath. Where in the universe are these feelings coming from I wonder. And then it hits me.

"I'm scared," I answer him.


	14. Ten: It’s What We Do!

**Solipsism**

**Ten: It's What We Do!**

Hearing that Jack Harkness is scared is frightening enough.

But hearing Captain Jack Harkness _admit_ that he's scared… Well… that's a horse of a different color and if you think about it, truly shocking. I mean I've seen the man laugh his way through situations that would cause any other being, much less any other human, to fall to their knees in abject terror.

Jack is the most fearless person I've ever known, bar none. It has nothing to do with his "immortality." His fearlessness predates that accident of fate, and besides, we both are well aware that "immortal" is literally too strong a term for it. We both know he can die. Permanently, forever die. But like I said, that's not what his fearlessness is based upon. The Captain was born with the courage and bravery of a hero. Valor is not something you get from an accident.

So, what does it mean when Jack Harkness tells me he's scared?

I've already had the TARDIS materialize inside the Newhope's shuttle bay. She's been here before. Very likely she was on the _exact_ same spot she now occupies (my TARDIS likes symmetry and so do I). But unlike before, what now lies outside her doors is basically deep space contained within a dead ship.

"Tell me what's going on," I ask him.

Jack's voice sounds small and distant. I don't think it's the com making it sound that way. "I don't know," he says, "something feels… I feel a sense of gathering wrongness."

I swear the next words seem to come out of my mouth of their own volition. "Jack, we don't have to go out there. We don't have to stay. We can leave. We can have the TARDIS take us somewhere else, she won't refuse. We could even come back later, if we want." Appallingly a part of me wants him to agree.

It feels like I'm holding my breath although, face it, the spacesuit would never allow me to actually do that – it has essentially taken over the more base physical functions like respiration in order to maximize the wearer's – in this case _my_ – survival. Still, it feels like a very long time indeed before Jack responds. In fact I'm just beginning to think that I need to say something else to him when I hear his voice.

"What you're suggesting sounds like the smart thing to do, but not the _right_ thing to do." I hear a modicum of resolve in his words. But just a modicum. "Besides," he continues, "I feel like I owe it to John to try to figure out what happened here, find out what's going on?"

He ends his sentence with what sounds like a question. I nod my head but then realize he maybe can't tell I'm agreeing with him. I ignore the small scrabbling thing that's nagging at me, clawing at the back of my mind; the gray, cowardly thing that made me say what I said in the first place and instead I decide to take hold of Jack's lead and run with it. After all, that's one of the things I do best!

"Jack, we've walked out of this ship many times into the unknown. Or worse. We've walked out onto a Slitheen in Cardiff, we've walked out onto the Game Station, we've walked out onto a Dalek mothership, and we've walked out onto the Crucible in the Medusa Cascade." I pause for a second and all of a sudden whatever was nagging me is gone. _Good-bye and good riddance._

"Jack…?"

"Yes, Doctor?"

I grin and I hope he can hear the size of it in my voice, "It's what we do!"

He walks over to me. We're visor-to-visor, his face softly illuminated by his helmet's internal lighting; just as my face is illuminated. He looks at me and I realize I'm having trouble reading his expression… _Damn helmets_. But then I see the crinkling of the laugh lines around his eyes. "Don't forget…" he says, "walking out onto the street in front of Sylvia Noble's house."

"Brrr…" I exaggerate a shiver. "What could possibly be worse than _that_?"

Jack laughs. "I don't know. Maybe walking out unarmed onto an abandoned ghost ship?"

I snort. "Been there, done that, no biggie…"

"Good," he winks. "I'll hold you to that."

"Well?" I ask as I raise my eyebrows expectantly.

"_Allons-y_!" he answers enthusiastically. Ah! A man of my own heart is Jack Harkness…


	15. Jack: Is That a Yes?

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Is That a Yes?**

I walk out the entrance and through the TARDIS force field, which is acting like an air lock right now, and turn and watch The Doctor as he closes the ship's doors behind him. I notice he doesn't lock them and I'm about to comment but then reconsider – after all, what else could possibly be around to get inside?

It's dark, but not quite as dark as I expected. There's a very dim flicker of emergency lighting in the shuttle pod bay. And our suits are generating a fair amount of ambient light. A couple of objects are floating around the cavernous room, but not as many as I assumed we'd see. Our boots automatically adjust to the absence of gravity and keep us securely anchored to the floor.

My HUD is displaying all kinds of data that I really don't want to see. I'm tempted to turn it off, but I know doing so would be a mistake. In these kinds of situations more information is always better than less. The head-up display is telling me the room is cold… no doubt about that, and no surprise, either. It's about five degrees Kelvin. But it's also telling me something else that is very interesting.

The Doctor is already on it before I can even finish assimilating the news. "It appears there hasn't been a perforate catastrophic decompression," he states. "There are traces of atmosphere."

"I see that, too," I say. "If we can get life support up, we may eventually have a viable environment."

"Do you remember how to get to the bridge?"

"I think so."

The Newhope is a large spaceship. Almost three kilometers in length. She was brand spanking new when I first encountered her. In fact so new that she was partially unfinished. The important bits were all there, but some of the less critical accoutrements like plumbing, the ship's messes and crew furniture left a lot to be desired. Still, she was beautiful. And fully kitted-out with the latest bleeding-edge tech. _And_ she was brilliant. The ship's AI was one of the most impressive and interesting I'd ever met. And by interesting I mean _peculiar_. I swear she had a sense of humor. Do you know how rare that is in an AI? They are usually such sticks-in-the-mud. She was also a bit devious… but she may have picked that trait up from her other Captain, John Hart.

I quickly put an end to that train of thought. It's painful to think about John at the moment.

"I don't believe it's much farther," I announce to The Doctor, who is walking a step or two behind me; a tiny slice of my HUD – a sort of virtual rear-view mirror – is displaying him. We're carefully making our way down yet another of what feels like an endless series of corridors. It is slow going. So far we've not come across anything particularly dangerous but any time you EVA you need to be extra-cautious. The amount of junk floating around continues to be minimal, but we've encountered some perilously loose hanging cables, and although I know our spacesuits are good, the thought of inadvertently puncturing one of them makes me nervous nonetheless. Never mind the notion of getting ensnared…

Suddenly I notice The Doctor has stopped. I turn to look at him. "Do you hear that?" he asks through my helmet's com. I slow my breathing and listen. I don't hear anything, but that means very little – I know The Doctor has extraordinarily good hearing. I close my eyes and strain. Still nothing… "No," I answer as I look at him again, "I'm sorry, I don't."

"Keep walking," The Doctor tells me. So that's what I do.

We walk maybe another 200 steps and again he stops. "Listen now," he suggests.

I inhale deeply, hold my breath and close my eyes. Then I hear it.

It sounds like a voice. Barely audible. At first it sounds like buzzing, but then I realize it sounds like a single word or phrase being repeated at a set interval. I can hardly hear it. I can't come close to making it out. But it's there. It's clearly there.

I turn, look at The Doctor and nod. "Can you tell what it is saying?" I ask.

"I'm not certain, and I prefer not to speculate," he replies. I want to groan – when has he ever_ not_ wanted to speculate? – but I hold my peace… if he doesn't want to speculate, he doesn't have to speculate.

"If I'm correct, we're only a couple hundred meters from the bridge. Shall we continue on, Doctor?"

"Always forward," he says.

"Is that a yes?"

"Yes."

We walk on in silence and then before I realize it or even have time to prepare, we're on the bridge. I gasp involuntarily. The ship's bridge is as I remember it, except it is dark and it is cold and it is vacant: there is no John Hart sitting on one of the beat-up Captain's chairs, smirking at me. The consoles and stations and terminals are dead. In retrospect I realize I really should've done something to prepare myself, because I am shocked to the point of near immobility.

"Jack? Jack?" I hear The Doctor's voice over the com and mentally shake myself.

"What is it?"

"Listen."

"Captain… Captain… Captain…" is now what I hear, albeit barely. The word is repeated over and over, separated each time by ten or so seconds of extremely faint static.

I fold my arms best as I can considering I'm in a spacesuit and suppress a shudder. "Wow," is all I manage to say.

"Clockwork Droids," The Doctor inexplicably says back to me.

"What?!"

"Ghost ships," he replies matter-of-factly. "Ghost ships are no biggies as long as you stay away from the Clockwork Droids."

I swear the man has attention surplus disorder.


	16. Ten: Mr Glass Half Full

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Mr. Glass-Half-Full**

It might surprise you, but then again maybe it won't, to learn that I keep a sort of ship's log. Actually, it's an offshoot of the Time Lord Galactic Database. During my last couple of regenerations it has become more of a diary than a simple logbook of destinations.

Jack's not looked at it. Well… that's probably because I've not told him about it. And it'd be pretty tough for him to stumble across it since it's encrypted with unhackable stream ciphers. I guess the log is kind of personal, but really, if it came right down to it I wouldn't mind sharing it with him.

If I had, he'd probably know what I meant by Clockwork Droids. As it now stands, he doesn't have a clue and to be honest I'm not all that anxious to go into a long story about Mickey, Rose and Madame de Pompadour. Especially Madame de Pompadour, although I'm sure Jack would be thrilled, in more ways than one, to learn about Reinette.

"Doctor?"

"Jack?"

"Um, what are Clockwork Droids?"

"They're a kind of android made up of intricate, beautiful clockwork that were on a ghost ship I bumped into once upon a time."

"Why are they important now?"

"They're not."

"So why did you bring them up?"

"Never mind, Jack," I pull out my sonic from a fastened pocket in the spacesuit, release it and watch as it floats slowly in the weightlessness of the bridge. "It's time we try to get this ship's heart beating again. Do you have any suggestions, Captain?"

Jack plucks the sonic out of the air and hands it back to me. "As a matter of fact, I do, and by-the-way, stop playing with that thing." He walks over to one of the bridge consoles. "This is the primary science station. It's the terminal John typically used when we were on the bridge together. If we can somehow get it resuscitated and back online, we may be able to start bringing up other ship's systems.

"But we're not going to get very far without ship's power…"

"Oh," I interrupt him, "I wouldn't be so sure about that..."

I know sometimes it annoys Jack when I announce what I'm about to say instead of coming out and saying it, so I continue on quickly. "The TARDIS is sharing a bit of her power with the Newhope. Normally she wouldn't be able or even willing to do that, especially if it is an unfamiliar ship, but she and the Newhope have a preexisting relation…_ship_. Uh, no pun intended."

"And you were going to tell me about this when?" Jack asks darkly.

"Well… right now. I'm telling you about this right now. It's nothing to be concerned about."

"It isn't?"

"No."

"The TARDIS has done this before?"

"Well…. Not exactly…"

"Doctor, we have to work on this communication thing."

My sonic starts to hum above the science station as I continue talking. Who says I can't multi-task?! "Really, Jack, the TARDIS has plenty of power to spare. She has loads and loads of power. She's a big ship, you know. In fact she's gigantic. I mean in comparison the Newhope is a tiny itsy-bitsy munchkin-sized baby ship. And the TARDIS is not going to be donating much power on a percentage-wise basis – just enough for me to get this terminal…

"Ah ha!" I announce jubilantly as the console's lights sputter a few times and then stay on. "What did I tell you?"

And there's no doubt it – it is an amazing sight to see – in this dark, dead, frigid room the various interfaces and monitors of the ship's master science station are coming to life. It is like a sign of hope, a heartbeat, a pulse…

And then to my continuing amazement as my eyes track along the length of the bridge, other ship's consoles are lighting up. Life seems to be taking hold and spreading! I glance at Jack and he's watching, too, as additional stations boot up and stay powered.

"_Doctor?"_ He's got that Mr. Glass-Half-Empty sound to his voice.

"What is it, Jack?"

"What's going on?"

"Uh, it looks like there's more than just the primary science station coming online."

"_Why?"_

"I would hazard to guess the TARDIS is taking things a bit farther than I anticipated."

"And this is a good thing how?" he asks, still with that same downbeat tone of voice.

I refuse to buy into his Mr. Glass-Half-Empty spiel. If anything, I'm Mr. Glass-Half-Full, and proud of it. Variety is the spice of life and all, but I have to draw the line somewhere.

"Yes it is, Jack. It is a very good thing. The TARDIS would never do anything to put us or herself in harm's way. Don't be such a worrywart, Jack. Accept a little good news when it's offered to you!"

At that very moment the ceiling lights switch on and I can't help but notice the lighting in one of the secondary corridors off beyond Jack is coming on. Jack is suddenly very busy staring over my shoulder, behind me, so I turn my head and look. The main corridor through which we recently entered the bridge is now fully illuminated as well.

"I suppose what you mean by that," Jack deadpans when I look back at him, "is that you don't want me to say I have a bad feeling about this?"


	17. Jack: Where the Hell is Leia?

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Where the Hell is Leia?**

Right… a _very_ bad feeling.

I guess if I had to choose to be a character out of science fiction, Han Solo wouldn't be the worst choice. But if I'm Han, who is _he_?

Maybe Luke? There is a definite similarity, a sweet sense of innocence and charm, and the bright shiny eyes and boyish smile. But if so, if he's Luke, where the hell is Leia?

Or maybe he's the Wookie.

I smile to myself… Actually I know who The Doctor is, he's Obi-Wan.

I'm not joking. If there's anyone in this or any other universe who is endowed with the Force, it's him. I've seen it in his eyes when he changes from being "just" The Doctor to being a Lord of Time. I've seen the strength, the righteousness, the determination, the wrath, and yes, even the fury.

"Jack?"

"Yes, Doctor?"

"Where were you just now?"

"Uh, same place you go sometimes when you're ignoring me?"

"Oh. Jack?" His voice is lyrical, almost sing-song.

"Yes, Doctor?"

"Have you looked at your HUD lately?"

Admittedly I haven't. So I start scanning the display. It doesn't take me long to figure out what is on his mind. "My God," I say, "grav-plating is coming back online and life support is nearly… It appears _viable_? How could that be?"

"It's the TARDIS. She's doing yeoman's work here." He secures his sonic back in the pocket from whence it came and starts fiddling with his helmet. To be more precise: he's fiddling with the mechanism that connects his helmet to his spacesuit.

And I can't help it; I get agitated Real Damn Fast. "Doctor!" I yell. "What in the hell do you think you're doing?"

He doesn't stop fiddling. "You said it yourself," he says matter-of-factly, "life support appears viable."

I walk to him and reach for one of his hands. He squirms just out of my reach. "_Appears_ and _is_ are two very different words," I growl. "Don't be stupid, let me test it."

But I'm too late; he's already removing his helmet.

What did I tell you? Remember? He doesn't look after for himself properly. See what I have to put up with? What is it about The Doctor that makes him want to take these stupid risks? It isn't like he has anything to prove. _Especially_ to me.

"What the hell is the matter with you?" I say.

"Jack! Your language! Think about the children!" He's got this goofy look on his face, which now that his helmet is off, I can at long last see clearly in all its exquisite detail. He's smiling and his eyes are dazzling and his hair – well, you can't imagine what his hair looks like. On a good day his hair looks ridiculous. And after being jammed into a form-fitting spacesuit helmet, well… maybe you _can_ imagine…

I close my eyes. No, I scrunch my eyes shut as tightly as possible and think about all the stuff, all the different things I want to say to him right now. They are all variations of _Why do you do that?_ But instead what comes out is, "So, how's the air?"

I'm not going to change him. I'm never going to change him. But I'd sure as hell like to understand him, and although I'm an old dog, I'm capable of learning new tricks. Next time he won't get by me so quickly. _If there is a next time…_ I open my eyes and look at him.

He sniffs. "The air's good, Jack."

I start fiddling with my helmet. "Here, let me help you with that," he says. And he does. My helmet comes off and I smell the air a few times. It's a sort of ridiculous reaction, to be sure. If there is a problem I'd be mostly dead before I could exhale my first breath.

I shake my head at him and he smiles again. This time there's a sort of apologetic quality to his grin. He knows he upsets me. Admit it: he knows way more than he lets on. Nothing he does serves only a single purpose. There are layers and layers of intentions behind his actions, I'm sure. God help me if I ever think I've got him figured out. The answers to _Why do you do that?_ would fill a library and none of them – _none of them_ – would be simple, straightforward or the least bit unsurprising.

He's standing there, holding both of our helmets – one in each hand – and blinking. I guess he's waiting for me to say something. I can't help but notice that the static-y voice in the background is still repeating "Captain… Captain… Captain…"

"Work to do?" I suggest.

"Up and at 'em," he responds.

I'm about to make a suggestion as to how to proceed when his eyes narrow.

"By the way, did you call me stupid back there?" he asks.

What did I tell you? Attention surplus disorder…

"You know," I say, "there's a reason they never let Picard go out on dangerous away missions. You take too many chances, Doctor."

"Wait, I thought you were Han Solo and now you're telling me you're Commander Riker?"

I do an actual, classic double-take and feel like I'm a cartoon character out of Looney Tunes. Sorry… am I inundating you with modern cultural references? Well, no matter, I didn't expect him to say _that_ and I literally guffaw. I mean, I try to hold it in but the fact that I attempt to suppress it makes the laugh, when it finally does escape, even louder and goofier than it otherwise would've been.

"No… Wait… I guess… Whatever." I'm stumbling clumsily over my words.

And by the look in his eyes I can tell he's enjoying it.


	18. Ten: A Little Fun

**Solipsism**

**Ten: A Little Fun**

What's life if you can't have at least a little fun? And what can I say but Jack is amazingly fun to have fun with… But there's a time and place for fun and now that's ending.

"Work to do." I remind Jack.

He nods and flexes his gloved fingers as he turns to the master science station and examines the ship's schematics. "Thanks to the TARDIS, it would seem we do indeed have viable life support and minimal ship's power. The consoles are fully booted but without the AI it's like lights on but nobody's home."

"I agree." I pause and hold my index finger up in the air. Jack looks at me. "Do you think that's her?" I ask him, referring to the mysterious disembodied voice.

"Newhope? I don't know. It doesn't sound like her but that really isn't meaningful. I suppose it could be."

The console I'm standing in front of is spewing out what looks like random machine code. Screens and screens of it. I don't see any obvious pattern to the data. I rub my hands together in anticipation and try the keyboard; it doesn't seem to affect what's displaying on the monitor. I stand and watch the information for awhile – I allow it to burn itself into my memory – then I move on to the next console. Again I watch for awhile, and then I see something. I recognize what's on the display. It's rendering the same identical code.

Interesting…

"Jack?"

"Yes Doctor?

"Along with John Hart, you were Co-Captain of this ship, is that so?"

"Yes."

"Were you supplied with or asked for any special password that would identify you as such? You know... a virtual key or unique identifier of some type?"

Jack looks up at me from the console he's standing over and nods. "Sort of. Why?"

"Sort of what? A password?"

"Yeah, exactly."

"Well, what is it?" I ask him and I hear the sound of impatience in my voice.

"Uh, it was linked to a retinal scan."

I shake my head. "I don't think a retinal scan is going to be validated, the system isn't operating at that high of a level. But a manually entered password might do it. Might help us get into the operating system's assembly language layer. What is it?"

"Um…"

"Jack? Don't make me ask you a_ third_ time…"

He walks over and stands in front of me. "It's just that, well, this is a bit embarrassing."

"Embarrassing how?" And there I was thinking the fun was over…

"Well… you have to remember when, you know, John first brought me on board this ship. It was after you left me, Doctor, after we got back from our second trip to the Shrake homeworld, and you left me standing alone that night on the roof of the Millennium Centre…"

"Right… I remember."

"Do you?" He looks at me and suddenly I feel a little uncomfortable. Actually all of a sudden I feel like I need to apologize for something. Something that was not intentional, and yet....

"Jack, I know neither of us wants to live in the past. Yet I do remember well that night and I'm sorry I hurt you. I knew then, Jack, that we had our own separate paths to follow but I also knew, I always have known, that those same paths would eventually come together, as they have."

"Doctor?"

"What is it Jack?"

"It's okay, really. I don't expect or need you to apologize. I just want you to know, getting back to the question at hand, that I was, um, still sort of infatuated with you when John tracked me down, when he rescued me after you'd left me alone that night."

"What about now, Jack," I ask. "Are you still infatuated with me?"

He shakes his head sadly. "No Doctor, I'm not."

And I can't believe I'm going to ask him this because I'm not sure I really want to know the answer, but it seems important and therefore I do. So this is me, asking away... "And how do you feel about me now, Jack?"

Amazingly, incredibly and unexpectedly Jack Harkness breaks out into a gigantic smile. "I've already told you," he says, "I will love you until the end of time. That's never going to change."

I nod at him. There's really nothing I can say to that. Is there? Well, actually I suppose there is.

"I love you too, Jack. Now tell me the damn password."

"It's _doctor_, okay? Delta-Zero-Chi-Tau-Zero-Rho"

"Ah." _No wonder…_

"Yep," is the clipped response.

I shrug, reflect for a long moment and then admonish him. "Six characters, Jack. It's not a _strong_ password."

"Strong enough for me," he winks.


	19. Jack: Exactly

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Exactly**

Well, what do you know? One small step and one giant leap all in one fell swoop.

I'd be giddy if I had time to be giddy. But soon as I tell The Doctor my password he's entering it on a keypad with one hand and brandishing his gently humming sonic with the other.

Suddenly the tone of the background static we've grown so accustomed to hearing changes, and it's definitely now Newhope's voice speaking, which in reality due to John's warped, to put it mildly, sense of humor is the voice of Gwen Cooper. Gwen/Newhope says very clearly, "Captain… Captain… Captain Hart you are in danger." And then all is quiet. No more voice. No more static. No more nothing, other than the sound of The Doctor's and my breathing. And I don't know about him, but my respiration rate just got kicked up a notch or two.

"Do you think you can get the AI back online?" I ask.

"If anyone can, I can," he responds immodestly as he twirls his sonic between his fingers. I shoot him a dirty look; he knows that I don't like it when he plays with that thing.

"Good," I say. "You get to work on that. I'm going to head aft to engineering and determine if I can get full ship's power back up and running. On the way I'll do some poking around, see if I can find any indication of what happened to the crew."

"There's a com ear piece under the flap in your collar that's linked to a mic on your suit," The Doctor tells me as he extracts a small object from a pocket by his neck. "We can communicate with them. Use it." He inserts his ear piece in his left ear and I do the same thing with mine. Then he nods and turns back to the console. It appears I've been dismissed so I shrug and walk away from him, back toward the main corridor and the ship beyond.

"Be careful!" I hear him say. I turn around and he's looking at me strangely.

"What is it Doctor?"

He starts, almost jumps at the sound of my voice. "Nothing," he says, "nothing. Just be careful, Jack."

I give him a snappy salute, pivot and walk off the bridge.

A few years ago… actually a couple of decades ago I was living in Chicago. That's in the United States. A friend of mine invited me along to a movie one night. An invitation I accepted.

The movie theater was on the South Side of Chicago. That's where my friend lived – the South Side of Chicago. If you're not familiar with the Windy City, the South Side of Chicago was _not_ where the wealthy white folk lived. It was _not_ where the wealthy white folk hung out. To be blunt, it was where the less wealthy, the _very_ less wealthy, people of color lived and played. The South Side of Chicago was also where some of the world's best blues clubs could be found. But that's another story or five…

So we went to this film, which was a horror movie called _Hellraiser_. I'll never forget it because it is the most fun I have ever had at a movie. The theater was totally packed. It was a hell of a scary movie and attending it was a 1980's version of an interactive experience. Throughout the entire show the audience was shouting advice – as well as other needful comments – to the onscreen characters. Being that this was a horror movie, said advice was very rarely followed.

"Don't you go in there alone!" I remember the woman sitting down a few seats from me yelling at one point. "Now why would you be so stupid?" _Exactly_, I thought.

You're probably wondering why in the world I'm telling you a story about going to see a movie twenty years ago. Well… Perhaps right at this moment you're _also_ wondering why I left The Doctor by himself. After all, it wasn't all that long ago we were referring to the Newhope as a ghost ship, and I admitted to The Doctor that I was scared. Perhaps you're thinking to yourself: "Now why would he be so stupid?" And: "Why is he going off alone?"

_Exactly…_

As I am walking down the corridor, leaving The Doctor and the bridge farther and farther behind, I find myself remembering that South Side Chicago movie theater and those marvelous people in the audience who may have had far more good sense than I have right now.

I gently touch the com in my ear and it beeps, "Doctor?"

"Yes Jack?"

"Are you okay?"

"Yes Jack."

"How's it coming?"

"It'd be coming a whole lot better if you weren't bothering me, Jack."

"Oh. Sorry Doctor."

My com beeps again as he signs off.

I keep walking alone down the corridor.

_Exactly…_


	20. Ten: Being Alone

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Being Alone**

The ship's AI – her artificial intelligence – is basically just a computer. Of course on a complicated ship like this, the computer itself is distributed across various and numerous locations. This is done for redundancy as much as anything. Newhope, the AI, is spread all around the ship and can't be said to live in any one particular place. The fact of the matter is she's everywhere. Thus another reason for her wide distribution: she's ubiquitous. Nothing that happens on the ship gets by her unless she allows it.

But calling her _just a computer_ is a misnomer. She's a quantum mechanical hypercomputer – infinitely powerful, infinitely fast and capable of completing infinitely many steps simultaneously. In other words, as Jack might say, she's way smart. She's so smart that she seems for all intents and purposes to be alive. And in fact she may be. What's your definition of sentience? What's your definition of life? Be careful because all of a sudden you might find yourself bumping up against Newhope.

Jack tended to anthropomorphize her, just as he anthropomorphizes Spike. Who's to say he is wrong in either case? In my own experience with Newhope, I discovered she had a wicked sense of humor. She was clearly also self-aware. In addition to that you might say she was capable of computing non-computable functions – in other words, she possessed subjective reasoning. She was intuitive. She had instincts. She made intelligent decisions.

This goes beyond "Cogito, ergo sum" and perhaps verges on mysticism. Although I don't admit it often, there are things in the universe I do not know. One of them is whether or not Newhope is alive. Because I am unsure, I prefer to err on the side of inclusiveness.

I know I have a reputation for being a bit of a risk-taker on occasion, but when it comes to Newhope, I do _not_ throw caution to the wind. Quite the opposite, I'm being about as circumspect as I can be. This is not for entirely selfless reasons.

One does not idly mess with a hypercomputer. You see, a "normal" computer, sometimes known on Earth as a Turing machine, can complete infinitely many instructions – but Newhope goes beyond simply being able to run for an unbounded number of steps forever. Maybe you caught what I said earlier? Were you paying attention? She can complete infinitely many steps _simultaneously_. A hypercomputer uses _time dilation_ to spend an infinite amount of time performing a computation while a finite amount of time passes for an observer.

So while I'm uniquely qualified to work with hypercomputers, and if you've not figured it out already that's because I'm a Time Lord, I also know that a misstep could make for one hell of a problem. I gently manipulate time, and on occasion it may appear that I have fun with time, or even control time, but I never screw with it. Ditto screwing with a hypercomputer; think of HAL in _2001: A Space Odyssey_ and multiply it a few gazillion times.

My sonic in hand and with my TARDIS in the background listening in, I tenderly, carefully, warily start to poke at Newhope. I'm moving from console to console, from terminal to terminal, trying different approaches; different bits of code, different protocols, different forms of communication, different types of interfaces. At first I'm not sure she's there at all, and I find myself wondering if the voice we'd heard, the mysterious warning, was some kind of remnant – a ghost – an aberration.

I keep trying. I have a lot of ideas and surely one of them is bound to work if Newhope is still viable. I'm not being immodest: I'm that good with computers. The large number of different workstation configurations on the bridge, with all their complex variety and diverse types of interfaces, is impressive and fascinating. You really can't blame me for being captivated; for becoming engrossed. It's like a high-tech version of an upscale chocolate shop. I'm carried away by the technology and it is exhilarating.

Then the display I'm working on suddenly goes dark. I frown at it. That's clearly a step in the wrong direction… But presently on the black screen a single, lonely blinking amber prompt appears. It's a right angle bracket, a greater-than symbol. As I watch as a series of letters slowly materializes next to it. Eventually I see six alpha characters followed by a question mark. I see:

**Doctor?**

I lean back and stare curiously. A second line appears below the first with the same content. And then a third, identical line emerges. While I'm considering what to do a fourth line renders and it is different than the preceding lines. After the right angle bracket four words are gradually revealed, one after another. The four words are separated by single spaces and the final word is followed by an exclamation point. This is what I see:

**You are in danger!**

As I watch, the words blink out once, reappear briefly, and then blink out again. I wait. It seems the monitor has gone dead.

And then I hear a noise behind me. Ah! I figure Jack has probably returned to bother me in person instead of on the com. I figure, too, that this is okay because I really wasn't enjoying being alone all that much.

I turn around. I'm right: I'm not alone. And I'm wrong: It's not Jack…


	21. Jack: An Amazing Gift

**Solipsism**

**Jack: An Amazing Gift**

Making my way down these brightly lit ship's corridors what I'm seeing is a whole lot of emptiness: empty hallways, empty intersections, dark and unused empty rooms containing sparse and vacant furnishings. All I hear is the sound of my own footsteps echoing off the floors, ceilings and walls. I'm tempted to com The Doctor again, but I withstand the desire, concluding it too inanely childish; I need to leave him be. Still, I'm feeling a bit spooked and so I start humming (and there is no rhyme or reason as to my choice of tune) the song "Beautiful." Right, an insipid pop song. Wil Beinert, the accomplished musician, the consummate classicist, would've laughed out loud at me. But like I said, there's no logic to it, it's simply what seeps irritatingly into my brain.

Although my ultimate destination is the main engineering section, which is at the aft of the ship, I find myself almost inexplicably heading toward Newhope's sick bay. Not that it's so much out of the way, but really there's no rational explanation for wanting to go there. And yet… the room holds significance for me. It is important and for some reason there's a part of me that yearns to see it again.

The time I spent previously on Newhope was extremely intense. It was intense because of me and what I was going through at that point in my life. It was intense because of John. And it was intense because of The Doctor.

Now don't laugh at me when I tell you my relationship with The Doctor is rather like an onion, as unromantic and banal as that may sound. I am on a singular journey – meticulously pulling apart the layers of that metaphorical onion, one by one, and discovering what lies beneath. Those layers represent personal epochs: before I knew him, when I met him, when I realized I was falling in love with him, when I died for him, when I was abandoned by him (don't let him tell you he didn't!), when I found him again, and again… _and again…_

It was there in Newhope's medical bay, standing next to the motionless, vulnerable form of The Doctor, holding his hand in mine and being so very frightened for his life, that I came to realize my love for him encompassed more than the mere physical longing I felt for his body and the mental longing I felt for his companionship. I realized there was something far more to it than those commonplace sentiments, and the realization shook me to my core. That realization later allowed me to expose without fear my bare soul to him and, ultimately, to become something more to him than just a simple friend or a threadbare lover – to in fact transcend myself and become something I've never been before. Something that I'm not even sure I have a name for. Something that I don't have adequate words to describe…

"The sun will always, always shine… But tomorrow we might awake on the other side," I sing softly to myself as I walk through the entryway of the ship's medical bay.

The lights come on automatically with the motion of my presence. Then, sort of as when you are looking at some geometric shape that looks like a tangle having no order at all, and you rotate it just a tiny bit, and suddenly all its planes and vertices come into alignment and you see what it really is, I see something that at first has no order – it doesn't make sense to me.

I blink and shake my head, as if it will help to clarify the sight. As if it will rotate what I'm looking at just enough for it to obtain order, to make sense.

"Hello, Jack," she says and I stop dead in my tracks.

"Hello Rose."

Rose Marion Tyler is sitting on one of the medical crèches. She's leaning against a stack of pillows. Her knees are pulled up to her chest, her arms encircling her legs. She smiles at me.

"How are you?"

"I'm fine. Um, Rose?"

"Yes, Jack?"

"What are you doing here?"

"Well, I miss you. Isn't that enough?" Her smile goes a little crooked and she winks. "But it's not just that, we need to talk."

I'm finally able to move again, so I walk over to the bed and look down at her. I take a deep breath. "I miss you too, Rose."

She nods and her smile becomes a little sadder. It makes me sad to see it.

"We never really got a chance," she explains, "to talk about what happened on Satellite Five. It's been bothering me. I wanted to apologize…"

"Rose, you have nothing to apologize for!"

"No, I do. I wanted to apologize. I never meant to leave you like that. If I had known…"

Suddenly Rose is crying. And it is breaking my heart. I reach down and touch her hair, her face. She's warm and soft. She reaches up and takes my hand and presses it tenderly, lightly to her lips before moving it slowly to her heart. I feel that strong heart beating rhythmically in her chest.

"If I had known what had happened to you, I would've tried… I would've done it differently. I don't know how, but I wouldn't have left you there. I mean I wanted you alive, I don't regret that, that part… But I would never have abandoned you. Not intentionally."

I sit down on the bed next to her. She scoots over a few inches and I stretch out on the mattress and put my arm around her shoulders. "Shush, Rose. It's okay, really. You gave me a gift that day. An amazing gift…"

Rose looks up at me and manages to smile though her tears. "I didn't want you to die," she half-whispers and then hiccups.

I chuckle quietly and give her shoulders a squeeze. "I didn't want to die."

She leans into me, puts her head on my shoulder. It feels good. I'm not complaining but aside from Spike it's the most physical contact I've had in weeks. Ever since Wil…

"So, Jack, you finally got what you wanted?"

I turn my head and look at her. "What do you mean?"

"You're traveling with him."

True enough, but there's something about the way she said that… I look away. I'm not sure how to respond. It turns out I don't have to.

"I'm happy for you, Jack."

"I can't replace you, you know," I answer, sounding apologetic but God knows what for. "No one can, ever. You're irreplaceable. He still misses you. He always will."

"You need to take care of him, Jack. For me, you must look after him."

I nod. "Always," I whisper.

"And, Jack, that amazing gift?"

"Yes?" I close my eyes and hold my breath. Oh my God. Could she take it from me? He never _really_ said…

"Don't squander it."

When I open my eyes again I'm standing in the doorway to the sick bay. There's no one there – the room is empty.


	22. Ten: The Hardest Thing

**Solipsism**

**Ten: The Hardest Thing**

My mouth is dry; my voice catches in my throat. "Susan?"

Her eyes sparkle, she says nothing.

"SUSAN?!"

She nods. "Hello Grandfather."

"Oh, Susan." My eyes well up with tears. I squeeze them shut and open them again; half-expecting she'll be gone, because of course this can't be happening.

But she's not gone.

Instead, she appears to be waiting.

She's just as I remember her: light as a feather, bright as the Sun, warm as a summer breeze, but with a wicked and all-too-knowing smile, and courage and brains to spare.

She's still waiting.

"I've missed you. I miss you." I murmur, the words seemingly coming of their own volition.

She smiles. THAT smile. My granddaughter's smile.

And then the floodgates open. "There've been so many things that have happened to me," I pour forth, "so many things I wanted to tell you about, show you, teach you, share with you. I've never stopped thinking of you. I've seen amazing things. And oh but I've seen dreadful things. I've encountered terrible enemies and discovered amazing friends. I've found such happiness and such sorrow…" I'm like an old man, reminiscing, gushing, and unable to stop. I'm suddenly and oh-so-vulnerably sobbing about the past, and I can't help myself.

Her smile grows as she walks over to me and looks up into my face. I lean down low enough to allow her to wrap her arms around my neck, and then I encircle her waist in my own arms and raise her high up off the floor. I laugh merrily as I swing her through the air, just as I did when she was small – only a child.

She buries her face in the crook between my neck and shoulder, just above my collarbone, and I feel her warm breath as she laughs. I squeeze her even more tightly as she holds me nearer. I can tell she's crying, too – my bare neck is getting damp from her tears.

I carefully put her back on the floor, move my hands to her shoulders and push her back gently so that I can look into her eyes. "Susan… How? What are you doing here?"

She slides her hands from around my neck and uses her finger tips to wipe away the tears running down my face.

"I got tired of waiting," she says, not at all unhappily, and then she shrugs. "You know, you_ promised_ you'd come back. I waited and waited but eventually decided that I would have to come to you."

My tears renew their onslaught. "Oh Susan, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I couldn't… I wanted you to have your own life, your own roots, your own future. I wanted you to be in love and have a family and a destination and a history all your own.

"It was the hardest thing I've ever done, Susan, leaving you. And I've had to do so very many terribly hard things."

She nods her head at me. "Grandfather, I did… I do have all those things. But I've never forgotten you, never stopped missing you. Never stopped loving you." We're both smiling and we're both crying.

"I stopped running, Grandfather. I learned to embrace instead of…" I can see her reaching for the word, stretching for it, struggling for it, "refuse."

I can hardly believe what I'm hearing. It makes me so happy.

"David and I have children!" she jubilantly announces. "You're a great-grandfather! Three times over!"

My smile broadens; it feels like it's going to crack my face. I can't stop looking at her, wanting to touch her.

"What about you?" she asks, looking more deeply into my eyes. "Are you still running away? Do you have someone?"

"Susan, I've had many someones." I feel the smile leave my face for a moment, but then it's back, bigger and brighter than ever. "I have someone now, his name…"

"_His?"_ she interrupts me with another wicked smile.

"His name is Jack. And yes, I'm still running, I'm always running. I'll never stop."

She frowns slightly and steps back to scrutinize me further. She's looking a bit maternal all of a sudden. I find it amusing and incredibly bittersweet. _Great-grandchildren?_

"I suspect that's true, you'll never stop running, will you?" she says. She _sounds_ a bit maternal, too. Maybe even a little disapproving. It makes the hairs stand up on the back of my neck.

She goes on, the words suddenly spilling out of her, "This Jack, are you taking good care of him, like you did me? Keeping him protected and out of trouble? Are you watching out for him? Should you be on this ship with him right now? Is he safe, Grandfather?"

I notice she's focusing on something behind me. It's a bit puzzling. I turn and look over my shoulder. I half-expect to see Jack; part of me is thinking I'll need to introduce him to Susan. But there's no one there. Just a bridge console…

When I turn back to answer her questions, and ask her a few of my own, she's gone.


	23. Jack: Wishful Thinking

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Wishful Thinking**

That was just fucking weird.

I stand and stare at the bed. There's no evidence Rose was ever there or that I ever sat on it. The bedspread and pillows are smooth, unmussed, firmly secured to the surface of the medical crèches.

And yet, it isn't _entirely_ impossible, having seen the things I've seen, experienced the things I've experienced, that Rose could've somehow managed to materialize. It is unlikely, I know, maybe falling more into the realm of wishful thinking than possible reality, but it felt like her, sounded like her, even smelled like her. I can still remember the touch of her hair and the warmth of her body against mine.

I involuntarily groan. I'm breathing harder and faster than usual; I feel like I just ran up twenty flights of stairs.

I com The Doctor but there's no response. I suppose he's ignoring me; no big surprise there – the man could teach a graduate course in rudeness. I laugh to myself; the bright shine of his impertinence is one of the things that attract me to him. I slowly back out of the door and into the hallway and watch as the sick bay, little by little, goes dark.

Shaking my head, I'm not sure what to make of what has happened, or what to do next. I take a couple of deep breaths. I suppose I should continue on as planned. But, despite the full-service spacesuit, I'm all of a sudden extremely thirsty; my throat feels raw and scratchy. I remember there are several crew's messes on Newhope and as I recall one of them is fairly close to main engineering. Certainly I should be able to scrounge up some water there, maybe even manage a cup of tea. I briefly imagine showing up before The Doctor, two steaming mugs in hand, and smile. It's something I would enjoy right about now, so why would he be any different?

As I start walking towards the kitchen another thought pops into my head. I am on an assigned mission, after all. The plan is for me to do a survey of engineering and see if I can get main ship's power back online. Bringing The Doctor a cup of hot tea needs to be postponed; no matter how much I'd like to do it and how attractive a fantasy it is. Nonetheless, I do still feel I could use some water, so I'll stop at the mess, grab a quick drink and then continue heading aft. I'll play at the tea-boy thing later – after I'm finshed in engineering.

Thus resolved, I pick up my pace.

At the risk of sounding repetitious – and you know I always try to avoid being boring! – I need to admit that one of the galleys on this ship (and not necessarily the one I'm heading toward) holds no small amount of significance for me. Now I have to explain – I don't think of my life as a string of pivotal points, of momentous places and events… you know, proverbial watershed moments. Rather, I view my existence more as a gradual progression in one direction or another. I think of this progression as ideas building upon experiences that are based on other ideas, which are based on other experiences, and so on. That being said, near the end of my earlier adventures with John on the Newhope, I experienced what can only be described as a sea change while he and I were in one of the crew's messes watching our untouched tea grow cold. If I thought long and hard about it I would probably conclude the decision I made at that table colored everything that has happened to me since, and ultimately led me to where I am now. It was something John said to me while we were sitting in that crew's mess which suddenly caused a fantastic flash of clarity. Have you ever had one? When all of a sudden the cosmos coalesces perfectly, and you know exactly where you need to go and what you need to do.

I saw my life stretching out before me, apparently limitless. I saw where I belonged in the universe. I saw the truth.

Do I make it sound auspicious? Even fateful? Perhaps momentous? Hmm… well don't be too sure. The universe is if nothing else fickle. And whoever it is that's running it has a wicked sense of humor. Nevertheless, what happened at that table put me on a path that has brought me to the here and now.

Newhope is a big ship, as I said. I didn't have a whole lot of time back when I was traveling with John to explore, although I did study her schematics. Nevertheless, I admit it; I get a little lost a couple of times as I continue to navigate my way aft. I've taken a couple wrong turns and am forced to backtrack. But don't tell my team in Cardiff that! They believe I'm a veritable living GPS. Still, I'm reasonably confident I'm heading in the right direction, and as I get closer I start to feel more and more certain. I'm even back to humming "Beautiful" again. Walking unaccompanied down meters and meters of corridors in a deserted spaceship isn't so different than being alone in the shower: who's going to hear me singing? Besides, my voice isn't _so _bad…

I thrust my hands into my pockets and then realize I don't have any pockets – damn! – I'm still dressed in the spacesuit The Doctor outfitted me with earlier. It isn't as cumbersome as the old NASA spacesuits, thank God; in fact in comparison it's rather form-fitting and quite light and comfortable. Still, it's not like I'm wearing my trusty old greatcoat!

I walk into a room and the lights come on. Nope, not the kitchen… it's just another forlorn and empty space. I've got to be close, though, I know that. My humming turns into quiet singing as I enter several more rooms. The acoustics are good and I allow my voice to rise and carry:

_To all your friends you're delirious  
So consumed in all your doom  
Tryin' hard to fill the emptiness, the piece is gone…_

I'm pretty certain the next room is the kitchen. Ahoy matey, there be water up ahead! I charge in. The lights come on.

And again I stop dead in my tracks.

"_Left the puzzle undone, ain't that the way it is?_" the person sitting at one of the small tables sings. Beautifully, too, I have to admit.

It's Wil.

"Oh no," I moan.

"Oh yes!" She smiles.

_Exactly…_

Come on. Don't tell me you're surprised


	24. Ten: Get Thee Behind Me

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Get Thee Behind Me**

For a moment I feel horribly alone.

I com Jack. There's no answer. I suppose I was a bit impolite to him earlier and now it's payback time.

I feel alone and also a touch annoyed.

"Jack doesn't need to be taken care of," I announce resolutely to the room. "But I do watch out for him as much as I can, which is no small feat, considering he's sometimes cantankerous, often argumentative, always insolent and has a hero complex. Oh, and did I mention? He's mostly immortal, so he's inclined to take risks…

"And by-the-way, what the _hell_ was that just now?"

My annoyance is getting the better of me. Arms outstretched, I turn in a circle and sweep the room visually.

There's no one else there. This is both good and bad. It's bad because, as I said, I'm still alone, and as a general rule of thumb I don't particularly like being alone – and I _especially_ don't like being alone at this moment in time. It's good because being thus alone I know I can do anything I want right now and no one will see me. No one will hear me. And right now I have to say I feel like flying off the proverbial handle.

I walk to the main science station and glare at it. "Tell me what that was! I know it wasn't real, even though it felt real. Even though it seemed real. Even though I wanted it, wished it, longed for it to be real. It wasn't Susan, it couldn't have been Susan. It can't be Susan.

"Was that in my mind or was it some kind of insidious holographic trick? Or was it some sort of sadistic alien presence? Or was it something else entirely? Something I've not encountered before? Something outside my experience and beyond my imagination?"

I'm pounding on the console.

"And why _her_? Why did it have to be her? It could've been any one of a number of… of hundreds… of people. Why was it Susan?"

I try to com Jack again. Still no answer.

"_And where the hell is Jack?!_"

"Doctor?" I hear a voice say behind me.

I spin around. "No!" I proclaim. "Not you!"

"Doctor? What's wrong with you?"

I laugh, it sounds almost maniacal. "What do you mean what's wrong with me? I'm seeing ghosts. What's _not _wrong about that?" I walk right up to her but instead of halting I continue walking in a circle around where she's standing. Rose's eyes and head follow me as I orbit around her as a planet revolves around its sun.

She shakes her head, "I'm not a ghost."

"Oh! Oh that's rich! Yes you are. You are most certainly a ghost. I left you stranded in another universe with my doppelganger. By now the two of you are, well, never mind… I won't dwell on that. You can't be here!"

"But I am."

"And why are you here?" I laugh again but continue on with my rant before she can answer. "Wait! Don't tell me! Let me guess! You're going to warn me I need to watch out for Jack, aren't you?"

"No, but that's very good advice," she says.

"Ha!" I laugh as I continue pacing.

"I'm going to tell you that it is dangerous here. You need to get Jack off this ship. It isn't safe here for either one of you. You need to leave, _now_, Doctor. Jack is important…"

"You think I don't know how important Jack is? Maybe you've forgotten? I'm a Lord of Time! I know what he becomes, who he becomes, and what he does."

"Then what are you doing here, Doctor?"

For an insane moment I feel like admitting I don't know what I'm doing here, that coming aboard this ship was a terrible mistake. I angrily discard that thought.

Instead I stop in front of her and growl, "Apparently I'm waiting to be haunted by three ghosts – the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future, if I'm not mistaken. Who's the third ghost, Rose? Who's the Ghost of Christmas Future? Can you tell me? Hmm?"

She reaches out and before I can move away she touches me and even through the spacesuit I can tell – my hearts lurch – it feels like Rose. I inhale sharply. I'm so tempted…

I so want…

I have an almost uncontrollable urge to hold her in my arms. The desire is so strong I can taste it. Instead, I yank my arm away from her and step back.

"Oh no you don't, you ghost you. Begone!" I yell.

She looks at me and smiles sweetly.

Then I reconsider, "But first, I have some questions…"

She shakes her head, "No questions."

"Not even one?"

She stares at me blankly.

"Alright then," I declare. "Get thee behind me." I'm tempted to try to stride right through her but instead I step carefully around, keeping well outside of arm's reach.

And then I leave the bridge, and Rose Tyler, behind.

Enough of this nonsense. It's time to find Jack.


	25. Jack: Doctor Whisperer

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Doctor Whisperer**

"What's going on?" I ask. "And don't tell me we need to talk."

Wil smiles and then laughs, "Okay, I won't. How are you, Jack?"

"Um, confused?"

"Why?"

"I really don't understand what's happening here." I'm trying my best not to whine, but despite my best intentions I hear that irritating bleating quality creeping into my voice.

"Is it important for you to know?"

"Well, yeah, it is." I walk toward her and thrust out my arms sort of theatrically. "What's the point of this? First Rose, now you?" I feel myself frowning. "What is this, a class reunion?"

She laughs again and her green eyes sparkle. I feel… well, do I need to tell you how I feel? I love the woman. I've missed her, body and soul. Especially body. I want to jump her bones but I'm also scared half out of my wits of her. _Of this…_

"No, it's not a class reunion," she answers. "But what's with the song? I mean, Jack, Christina Aguilera? Come on!"

I'm blushing. "Yeah, I know… pretty lame isn't it?" I can't help but laugh at myself.

She leans back in her chair and crosses her arms. "Nah… it's not that _lame_. It's a good song, and I really like Elvis Costello's cover of it…"

There's a brief pause but then she gestures at the table and continues. "So are you going to sit down or what?"

Reluctantly I pull out a chair and sit down. I have to rearrange the spacesuit to make it more comfortable and that takes me the better part of half a minute. When I finish I look at Wil, who's been watching me studiously.

"Nice spacesuit," she says approvingly, "looks bleeding edge. Quantum semi-conductive fibers?"

I look down at myself and then back up at her and nod. "The suit is more alive than some people I know. It can emulate a broad spectrum of materials in response to ambient conditions. It's incredibly smart and responsive. And surprisingly comfortable." I realize I don't want to give her the wrong impression so I add, "By the way, it's The Doctor's, not Torchwood's."

"Right," she's suddenly looking at me pensively, "the two of you?"

"We're traveling together. _Just_ traveling together." Suddenly I feel nearly overcome, "Wil…?"

"Yes Jack?"

"_Why _did you leave me?" There's anger in my voice. Quite rightly, too, I might add.

"Oh Jack..."

I can tell she doesn't want to answer me, she's got that evasive look, and it makes me even angrier.

"No, really," I hiss. "I need to know. Why. Did. You. Leave. Me?"

She leans forward and steeples her hands on the table in front of me. "Jack, I have things to do. Things I need to do. They don't, they can't involve you." She shakes her head and it infuriates me.

"What do you mean? That's not an answer. I have things to do, too. Things I need to do. And everything I wanted and needed to do _included you_. Wil, I love you. I had plans… I had plans for us. I wanted to marry you. I wanted to make babies with you. Do you know how long it's been since I felt that way? Do you know how long it's been since I loved anyone as much as I loved you? Do you know how long it's been since I trusted someone as completely as I trusted you?"

She reaches for me but I pull back. There's incredible sadness on her face, in her eyes. I'm hurting her – I know it – but there's no stopping me now. I'm enraged.

"You still haven't answered my question!" I half-yell, half-cry.

She lowers her voice, it's barely above a whisper, "Jack… do you remember?" she looks away from me and her voice cracks, "do you remember the first time I left you, the message I left for you?"

I calm myself and stretch my memory back. Of course I remember it. How could I forget? She hurt me then, too.

"Do you really want to bring that up right now?"

She nods, "Yes, I do. Do you remember what I told you?"

"You mean when you invited me to look you up in a couple of billion years?"

She smiles at me, "Well, I did say that, to be sure. But no, not that part. The other part… the part about _him_."

I lean forward. I know who she's talking about. "You told me to keep an eye on him."

She reaches for me again; this time I allow her take my hand between hers. Her touch is electric and I stifle a small gasp. I want her so badly it hurts.

"Yes I did. He's important Jack…"

"_You're_ important!"

"_He's_ important, Jack. You need to keep him safe."

I move my other hand to her hands and now we're leaning close to each other, our fingers intertwined, and our foreheads only inches apart. "I know, and I do."

"Then what are you doing here, Jack? Why didn't you listen to yourself, to your better judgment? You shouldn't be here, Jack. Neither of you should be here."

I shake my head, "I know, I know. He's a hard man to say _no_ to."

"You need to learn Jack. He'll listen to you. He always has and always will. You need to learn to say _no_ to him, and you need to start now."

I smile. "Doctor Whisperer."

She laughs. Still clinging to her hands I stand up and move to her side of the table. She stands up and I take her in my arms and kiss her deeply. "Don't leave me again. I need you," I murmur after finally I come up for air. Then I close my eyes and kiss her again. I feel her body pressing into mine and I feel my reaction to her, my urgent tumescence. I push her hard against the edge of the table; I want her, right here, right now. I want her and by the gods I'll have her.

And then she's gone and…

Don't tell me you're surprised.


	26. Ten: Just This Once

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Just This Once**

I storm out of the bridge and deep into the ship's corridors.

It occurs to me that I have no idea where I'm going.

I mean, literally _not a clue_.

Still, I feel a strong desire to get away from where I was. To get away from what was happening to me. And to get away from_ her_.

I realize I'm trying hard not to cry. I'm also working very hard at not putting my fist through the wall. I am furthermore making perhaps a futile effort to keep my hearts from exploding in my chest.

Susan… seeing Susan was bad enough. I've never gotten over the horror of separating myself from her, of closing the door on her, of ripping us – what we had – asunder. There are pieces of me, of my soul, of my _being_, that vanished along with her, that have remained with her, and that I've never recovered. Do you think I'm proud of it? Do you think I'm proud of what I did? She was my only family!

But Rose? Even now I want to turn around, return to the bridge and call her back to me. Beg her to come back. Sure I miss Susan, I always will. _But Rose?_ It's killing me – I'm dying for Rose. Not once but _twice_ I've had to let her go. How in the name of all things bright and beautiful can I be asked to give her up a third time? I would die happily if I could die in her arms, if only it meant I would find her once more, that she would come home to me.

How much more of this do I have to take? My people… My planet… My Rose…

I am not made of stone. I am not unfeeling. Despite all appearances, I do not compartmentalize and forget. I do not shut off and shut down. I have desires. I have longings. I have needs. I have devastating, overpowering needs that have not been met in years… in lifetimes…

I stop but instead of putting my fist through the corridor's wall I press my palms against its smooth, unyielding surface and slide slowly to the floor, concurrently turning and leaning against it with my back, my head in my hands.

There's a part of me that knows I'm being pathetically self-indulgent, but surely that's allowed? Just this once, if only this once. Wherever it is that I am – this place, this ship – it is not a safe place, to be sure. The floor has been ripped out cruelly from beneath me. These thoughts I'm having are not safe thoughts. I shake my head slowly, close my eyes even more tightly and I… well, I suppose you might call it _pray_. I pray for strength and courage and guidance but I am not praying to some omnipresent, omnipotent god-like being. I am, in fact, calling upon myself; I am entreating the legacy and power of the Time Lords I carry within.

Because in the end that is all that is left to me. I am so alone. I was alone before the Time War, but now even the Time Lords themselves have disappeared and forsaken me. All that remains of my people are the precious shadows I carry. Their memories. Their now-stilled voices. What remains of them is inside me, and so I beseech those remnants, my own heritage: let us pray...

If you think I've got a God Complex, well… who am I to disagree?

And so at length I open my eyes, look around and observe that I am unceremoniously plopped down on a floor in a mostly empty, derelict spaceship that someone obviously very, very much wants me to leave. It is hard to make myself realize, much less accept, but the difficulty makes it no less true: many of the thoughts I'm having are not my own. They do not belong to me. _Tricky bastards._

Who are they? _What_ are they? I wonder. I'm tempted to go back to the bridge and try to conjure up Rose again. Two can play the trickster game and I imagine I might cleverly summon up some more information out of her. Still, I also suspect my desire to go back and find Rose is not entirely unambiguous; the temptation has not fully relinquished its grasp on me. But I don't like the thought of losing myself to her; and I admit that very situation is possible. Perhaps even probable. I can feel it. I could so very easily give in to whatever it is she's trying to sell me. I want to evaporate in her. Drown in her.

On the other hand, I think, as I unfold myself up off the floor into a standing position, there's Jack… If I'm being haunted by the ghosts of Christmas, I can only imagine what might be happening to Jack Harkness, a man who is haunted by malevolent phantoms even during the best of times. And in one respect both Susan and Rose _were_ correct: I do need to take care of him. Retrospectively I should've never allowed him to go off on his own in the first place. There was no real reason for us to separate. It was a stupid plan. It isn't as if we're in some kind of huge rush.

But then I remember Newhope's power situation. The TARDIS cannot sustain Newhope indefinitely. So while there isn't a strict deadline, we are indeed operating under time constraints…

I pull out my sonic. It buzzes to life.

…And I do indeed need to find Jack.


	27. Jack: Fangs and Claws

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Fangs and Claws**

I have stood here for minutes. Minutes and minutes. I'm not crying. I wish I could. I'm not screaming. I wish I could. I'm standing, and I'm alive, but I'm deader than I've ever been. My hopes…my dreams… are all dead. But this should come as no surprise. I already knew that inner deadness to be true; it has been _my_ constant companion. Yes, my hopes and dreams were already long gone. They disappeared when she disappeared. And yet I now have the privilege to experience the pain all over again and it sucks, big-time.

Fuck.

My breath is coming in short little gasps. My chest hurts. My forehead is beading up with sweat. My eyes are open but I'm not focusing properly. Could this be a heart attack? How strange, I've not thought of it before. I know that inflicted violence in all sorts of flavors can not kill me everlastingly, but what about a massive myocardial infarction? If my heart muscle was catastrophically damaged by disease, would it heal?

I discover that I have no idea…

I shrug it off. This is simply not the time to have a heart attack. Besides, someone's relying on me. I'm on a mission. I have a job to do.

I no longer feel thirsty. I no longer feel anything at all. All I know is that I no longer want to be in this room. I walk out, get my bearings, and head towards engineering.

I no longer have a desire to sing, or even hum. I think back, just a short time ago, really, and it seems like it was a different person who'd decided he needed some water. It was a different person singing that cheesy Christina Aguilera song. _That_ person was unimaginably and profoundly happier. He seems like a stranger to me now. I don't have anything in common with him. I can't imagine what it's like in his head, or what it's like to be happy enough to hum a tune.

Not only is he a stranger to me, I don't like him. I want nothing to do with him.

It isn't long before I find myself in engineering. And what a shock.

After all the empty rooms and echoing corridors, engineering is alive with visual and audible stimuli. It's chock-a-block filled with buzzing and humming equipment and consoles. My eyes are dazzled by the sight. The TARDIS has been busy…

Difficult as it is, I discard my previous fruitless line of miserable contemplation and begin doing what I came to do – a thorough survey of the facility. Easier said than done; it's been a long time since I was on the Newhope and I'm not all that familiar with interstellar Jump drive tech. That being said, as I walk around on my inspection it seems to me the ship's matter-antimatter assemblies and power plants appear intact and fully viable.

This is curious. And confusing. I had believed, really convinced myself, that I would find problems here. Big problems. Why else would the ship have ended up like she did, lost in space, if not for a catastrophic failure in engineering? But I see neither hint nor whisper of failure. I'm able to ascertain with reasonable confidence her tachyon field injectors are undamaged.

As far as I can tell, this bird should fly.

So why…? I'm still walking around when I see something that nearly makes me faint with surprise. It's out of the corner of my eye, because I've not been paying any mind to them, but what catches my attention is one of the section's escape pods. It's activated; meaning its exterior panel lights are blinking. Blinking rhythmically. Like it's occupied. Like there's someone inside.

Now isn't that odd?

I walk up to the pod and stare. There's no way to tell who or what is inside: there's no little window in the escape pod like they sometimes show on Star Trek. I try to make some sense of the life support panel but I'm at a disadvantage, I don't know what the various indicators are indicating. Respiration rate? Heart beat? Brain activity? Growth of fangs and claws? Could be anything...

But I'll tell you what _is_ pretty clear: how to open it. There's a big sort-of clip-looking-like thing. But it's not manual; it's an electronic clip, a virtual clip, you might call it, just designed to appear kind of analog; it's some clever engineer's bit of a joke. I touch it. Really, that's all I do. I touch it. Honest. Just barely with the tip of my spacesuit-gloved index finger.

And then I pull my hand away in alarm. Suddenly the panel lights are going nuts. I step back in apprehension and take a deep involuntary breath as the escape pod basically splits apart with a loud creaking-cracking fracture-like sound – similar to something you might hear in a truly terrible science fiction movie. Adrenalin explodes in my chest, getting me ready big-time for fangs and claws.

But inside the pod, John Hart's eyes flutter and then fly open. I see his pupils constrict sharply. I can't begin to describe the look on his face. It is not a pleasant one.

"Oh no! Not you again!" he growls at me. "Didn't I tell you to leave me the fuck alone?"


	28. Ten: Remnant

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Remnant**

I stop. "Ah, don't tell me, the last of the spirits… the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come?"

River is waiting in the corridor ahead of me, leaning against a wall. At first she just stares at me, but then she nods once silently in my direction.

Even though the hallway is well-lit, there's a strange sort of eerie darkness about her. It would appear an escalation of sorts is in progress.

"Well, if you're expecting me to bend down on one knee in supplication, you'll be waiting a long, long time. You might as well get it over with… what is it you want to tell me? Do you have a secret to whisper in my ear?"

She says nothing in response, nor does she move. Doesn't matter to me… if there's one thing I can do, it is jabber.

"Cat got your tongue, River? Or maybe you're just keeping in character because if I recall correctly – and you know I usually do! – the Ghost of the Future does not speak. It just stands there ominously pointing… pointing somewhere, but where? I can't quite remember…" I laugh, but admittedly the laugh sounds a touch frenzied.

"Ah, still nothing? I have a feeling this is going to be a short conversation, Spirit. I'm a busy man with things to do, and places to go, so let me try to move this business along. You're here to warn me about earthquakes and horsemen and trumpets and the sun disappearing and the moon turning blood red and the End of Days unless I get myself off this ship, no?"

I pause and there's no response other than the icy stare.

"Hmm, I think I liked you better when I couldn't shut you up, River. You're creeping me out a bit, I admit, but really this whole discussion is mainly just a bore. I don't mean to be rude… well, actually, I suppose I do, but I'm leaving now. Bye!"

As I resume walking toward River's specter she steps away from the wall and stands in front of me, as if to block my way.

She meets my eyes steadily and then uses her finger to point to the floor in front of me.

I suppress an urge to shudder and look down.

I see a small blue smudge against the stark whiteness of the deck. As I crouch down closer to the fragment I realize what it is. It is a blue feather – a little piece of down, actually. I want to recoil from it but instead I reach out and briefly, ever so briefly, touch it lightly, gently with the tip of my gloved index finger. I know it well, it is a remnant.

My exhaled breath shifts the vestige, a reminder of Varna Aden Timmochan, softly across the smooth flooring. In its place splats a tiny drop of water – a tear.

I straighten up, feel my jaw crack as I set it, and move on.


	29. John: Fifty fifty Survival Odds

**Solipsism**

**John: Fifty-fifty Survival Odds**

"And what the fuck is that ridiculous suit you're wearing?" I spit on the floor, more due to the physical reaction of being so rudely interrupted from my hibernation in the pod than true dislike.

Although there is some of the latter as well. A lot of it, in fact.

It was bad enough having to deal with his specter the last time. It was bloody hard. The other ghosts… well, I could handle them, but Jack? I wanted so badly for him to be real; I wanted so badly to touch him, for him to touch me.

This is just fucking unfair.

I yank the pod's contacts from my forehead and step out and clear of it. I had believed I'd be safe from any further paranormal visitations while ensconced in the pod. Obviously I was wrong, and it really pisses me off.

"What are you still doing here?" I yell at the thing. "I'm not going to listen to you, you know. I'm not going to behave how you want me to behave. I don't want anything to do with you at all. Go away!"

I notice the thing isn't smirking at me with its ubiquitous all-knowing smile. It isn't giving me its usual spiel. It isn't trying to entice me. It isn't trying to touch me. It's just standing there, blinking at me with a surprised look on its face.

"John?" it says; its look of surprise becoming one of bewilderment. "Is it really you?"

"Oh, clever try! Go fuck yourself!" I hiss.

Now it looks sort of hurt. How bizarre.

"John," it says, "it's me, Jack. Really."

I don't want to believe it; I can't let myself believe it, not after everything that has happened. It is trying to trick me, to lure me into its clutches in a different way than before. I won't fall for it. I made that mistake once already and look what it wrought; I won't fall for its trickery again.

"John, don't you recognize me? I'm Jack!" it steps towards me, hands reaching, fingers grasping. I back away in horror and, I admit, fear.

I snarl in response, "What person who is _nothing_ like me are you saying that to?"

"John, what happened to you?"

It assumes a non-threatening pose, relaxing its arms again at its sides. I see a look on its face, a particular look, the same look I'd given Captain Jack Harkness on one specific occasion when I'd asked him the exact same question, and suddenly a small bubble of hope forms inside my chest. I can't help it. You know what they say: it springs eternal. And God help me, I want to believe.

"Jack?" I half-whisper.

"John?" is the reply.

"Is it really you?"

He smiles at me. "Depends… how dorky do I look in this spacesuit?"

"Well, on a dorkiness scale of one to ten, I'd say about a twelve. And your hair's a mess."

He reaches up to his head and smoothes back his hair, "Any better?"

I shake my head. I'm crying. But not because of Jack's hair. "No, you're a lost cause. Always have been, always will be. No amount of salon product could ever control…" I'm unable to go on.

He does not move toward me but he does open his arms wide in invitation.

I have to decide. I know that if I go to him, and I'm wrong, that I'll be lost. I'll be lost forever in the clutches of something that I can't even begin to understand and which is far more powerful than me. I will be lost and there will be no hope of escape. _Ever._

I have to decide. I've become weary of the battle. If there is no other real escape available, perhaps, I think, losing in this particular way isn't the worst thing that could happen to me. Disappearing forever into the arms of the shade of Captain Jack Harkness? I can think of worse ways to go.

I have to decide. Am I done fighting or not? I've always claimed I wanted to go out fighting but now that it comes down to it, it's a damned harsh way to die.

He's still standing there, arms outstretched. He notices me looking at him. "John, are you okay?" he says softly.

I nod my head but otherwise don't budge. "Yes. I'm fine. I'm good. I'm just peachy." My words ring hollow.

"You know, John, when people answer that question in _that_ way, usually they aren't."

And then he, too, nods his head. But it is a slow, barely perceptible nod and that's all it takes; I figure I have fifty-fifty survival odds as I step into him.

He envelopes me in his arms and I bury my face in his neck. The first thing I notice is that he smells like the _real_ Jack. Not like the idealized version of Jack. Not like a dream of Jack. Even with the spacesuit, I can taste his scent and I recognize it.

"Oh, Jack," I cry. "Is it really you?"

He just squeezes me tighter and for a microsecond I fear the worst, but then he whispers hoarsely, emotionally, "Yes, it's me," and I know it is the truth.

I'm so relieved I feel faint, like my bones have turned to water. I squeeze him back with all my might. "Oh my God," I breathe, "oh my God."

We stand for awhile like this, in each other's arms, unspeaking, rocking slowly back and forth. We're both sobbing.

Finally he presses his lips to my forehead and then pulls back just the tiniest bit. He takes his hand, cups the side of my face and looks into my eyes.

"John, what happened here?"

"I don't know… horrible things… awful things… terrible things. Jack, the ship… the ship tried to kill me. _This_ ship… _my_ ship tried to kill me."

"Hush," he says, as he strokes my face. "It's okay. I'm here. I'm going to take care of you."

I close my eyes for a moment, catch my breath, and silently offer up a prayer of thanks for Captain Jack Harkness. When I look at him again his blue eyes are peering into my soul.

"But John, where's Varna?" he asks me. He asks me but I don't want to answer him. I'm afraid of answering him. And yet he deserves to know. He deserves an honest answer if he came all this way to rescue me. _If he came all this way to rescue us…_

"Oh Jack, it was dreadful! Varna's dead! The ship… Newhope… murdered her!"

Suddenly there's a noise. My breath catches in my throat. I feel Jack tensing. For a second I'm petrified. We both turn instinctively toward the sound.

We both see him at the same time. It's The Doctor; I don't think there's any doubt it's really him, and boy does he look pissed.


	30. Jack: A Terrible Predicament

**Solipsism**

**Jack: A Terrible Predicament**

I don't know what's harder. Hearing the terrible news about Varna or seeing The Doctor's face as he absorbs what John has just said.

I have seen him really angry before. In fact, I have seen him really angry at _me_ before and I really, really hope to never have it happen again. But I've never seen him _this_ angry. And do I need to tell you, this anger? It is entirely in his eyes.

The amazing irony – and isn't this just how things always go? – is that I was feeling such profound and precious relief at finding John alive. I'm not entirely sure why, but I never doubted for a moment it truly was John Hart and not some sort of phantasm emerging from the escape pod. Maybe it was only because I so very much wished it to be so, but I never disbelieved what my eyes were telling me.

Granted, John and I have had our ups and downs. We've been enemies, we've been lovers, we've been accomplices, we've been co-conspirators, we've been heroes and we've been villains. But no matter what, the tie that binds us together has never snapped. Just like how I feel about The Doctor, John is always a part of me, whether I am physically with him or not. Just like The Doctor, John is a permanent fixture in the living room of my soul.

But unlike The Doctor, John Hart indulges if not revels in violence and the sensuality of brutality. Unlike The Doctor, John Hart has never placed morality high on his list of personal objectives. Unlike The Doctor, John Hart's ambitions and aspirations are ambiguous. You cannot ever truly trust John Hart. He's a fine man to have on your six as long as he doesn't pull a knife and insert it between your shoulder blades.

_Like_ The Doctor, John Hart is unpredictable, capricious and sometimes even fickle.

As I look at The Doctor, his brown eyes pools of darkness against the ghostly white of his shockingly pale face, I realize I have no idea at this moment how he is going to react to that most terrible news. Surely he heard it, although to be honest I do not know how long he has been standing there, watching us. He might have seen the entire exchange, and although I have nothing to be embarrassed about, I'm suddenly uncomfortable regarding the words I spoke and how I touched John. I file away this strange uneasiness for dissection later.

"Get away from him, Jack," The Doctor snarls, his eyes suddenly searing.

"Doctor?"

"Don't make me say it a second time."

John's face is a study in apprehension. And why not? All of us have heard stories of the Time Lords, the powers they possess and the rage they can bring to bear. I've seen what can result from the fury of _this_ Time Lord, and I would not wish that fury on anyone whom I might call "friend." John's eyes are pleading.

And I realize I am caught in a terrible predicament. Do I need to spell it out? Abandon John or oppose The Doctor. It's lose-lose and I hate lose-lose situations. I try to avoid such circumstances like the plague.

I turn my attention back toward The Doctor. "Please…" I say, but that's as far as I get.

"Jack," he sneers threateningly, eyes ablaze, as he pulls out his sonic and walks toward me, toward us.

In abject shock I realize he's going to use the fucking thing as a weapon. I've always suspected, but… I have never actually seen him do it. I react viscerally and without thought. I step back; I step away from John and in my shame I can't bear to look directly into his face.

With each of the Time Lord's steps in John's direction I take another step away. It is like some sort of obscene, ghastly dance. As The Doctor reaches my friend, his target, the sonic hums ominously and John closes his eyes, like a man about to be shot through the heart and thereby executed. I want to do the same thing – shut my eyes – but I force myself to watch. This is my fault, after all. I am a coward and a betrayer. I suck in a shallow breath and hold it.

And then inexplicably The Doctor lets his sonic drop to his side as he turns to look at me. "He's real!" he exclaims, a look of mild yet noteworthy surprise on his face.

I blink, unable to speak. But it turns out I don't need to because John has recovered quite nicely, thank you, for a man who was just about to meet his maker.

"Damn right I'm real," John hisses. "Who died and made you God? Gave you the right to go around threatening people with that… that_ thing_?" John is glaring at the sonic in The Doctor's hand.

"Oh this?" The Doctor holds the sonic up in front of his face. "It was just in life form detection mode, you see I've run into…"

"You too? You've seen them? I mean, you've had encounters?" I blurt out.

He nods back at me and as he does his expression grows darker.

"Doctor," John says, "you need to tell me – did you look into any of the optical user interface adapters on the bridge?"

It's clear The Doctor is off mentally meandering somewhere else and not expecting John's question. For the briefest moment there's a flash of puzzlement on his face, but he regains his composure quickly. "You mean the console scanners? Yes, several..." He pauses for a beat. "Oh…"

John nods, then looks at me and explains, "_Oh_ is right. It's the ship. Newhope. The nanoid com devices she placed into our frontal lobes, Jack. She can use them to exert influence on us… make us see things that aren't there." He swallows hard, "Feel things that aren't true and even do things we might not normally do."

Then John turns back to The Doctor. "No doubt she put one in your head when you looked into the UI adapter; you wouldn't have felt it. You were probably slightly influenced by her before that – I'm supposing you're at least somewhat telepathic like most highly advanced races – and therefore were indirectly and perhaps significantly affected by Jack's implant. Look, these devices are audaciously powerful and the ship's gone stark raving mad. She has some sort of covert agenda. I don't know what it is, but whatever she doesn't want anyone else along for the ride. She's trying to rid herself of us, one way or another, and I have no doubt she'll eventually succeed."

He pauses, waiting. I can tell he knows what's coming next and I suddenly get a reminder of how brave John Hart truly is.


	31. Ten: Keeper of Secrets

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Keeper of Secrets**

I have lost companions to death. Many companions. Too many companions. And more than you know.

Did you think you know everything about me?

Ridiculous! I am a keeper of secrets, it is my nature.

Of those companions you recollect, here is my list – I have lost these to the "final adventure": Astrid Peth, the most recent and raw of the deaths, Katarina, Adric, Kamelion, and Sara Kingdom were all taken from me, all died violently, some heroically; Susan Foreman and Romana were lost in the Time War.

I am not pleased to learn that I will have to add another name to that sad catalog of death.

John is watching me, waiting for me to ask what I must ask and yet do not wish to know. Out of the corner of my eye I see Jack, my one companion – he who is so much more than a mere companion – who has managed to successfully and repeatedly cheat extinction.

Jack is looking at John, and in my mind's eye I see the glimmering thread that runs between them, the eternal cord that binds them together. The thread is thick and robust; it links their lives permanently, profoundly, and throughout time in all its myriad permutations. I don't mean to pry, I mean I don't _want_ to pry, but the shine and radiance of their connection is inescapable and cannot be ignored. There is a part of me that is envious; I suppress that envy instantly, I have no right to be jealous.

I am a keeper of secrets. I conceal. I obfuscate. I disguise. I complicate.

I let _you_ in; I let all of you in, but only to a point. No one will ever know everything. I am a Time Lord from Gallifrey. Shrouded in obscurity I come and go. This is the way it must always be. Forever and ever.

"Tell me what happened." The sound of my voice surprises me. It is low, soft, calm. Nothing like how I am feeling. Nothing like the hardness I know showing in my eyes. "Tell me about Varna Aden Timmochan."

John inhales loudly and purses his lips. He glances at Jack. He is frightened. But of what? Perhaps of me but he has to know that I would never harm him… unless… unless he is culpable. Unless he is implicated in the death of my companion.

If that is the case, I make no guarantees. I promise nothing.

"The ship started behaving strangely…" he begins.

Jack makes an odd sound and John sadly shakes his head, "No, not that way. Jack, we – you and I – were well aware Newhope was not your normal ship's AI. She was special, unique, and we experienced that exceptionalness together. But _this_, this was different. She would withdraw, not answer questions. Or she would provide bizarre answers. It didn't happen all the time but it was frequent enough to make Varna, and to a far lesser extent me, suspicious. But it was mostly Varna really, because I was having trouble fully absorbing, fully appreciating what was going on. I realized later this is because of the com I was, I still am, carrying around in my brain… but, I'm getting ahead of myself.

"Varna was aware of the com, of course. At the time, we weren't concerned about it but she had vehemently resisted having her own inserted due to physiological differences. At least that's what she claimed, but in retrospect she may have had other suspicions she wasn't sharing with me. I don't know.

"As I said, the ship was exhibiting odd behaviors. I think about the same time Varna stopped trusting Newhope she also began to have concerns for me. _About_ me. Newhope did a couple of things wrong. I mean really wrong. She made several mistakes; errors in judgment. There were a number of almost freakish accidents. I think she was testing us. And maybe trying to frighten us as well. Again, at the time, it just didn't compute for me; the puzzle wasn't coming together. However, I could tell that something was deeply disturbing Varna and I could also tell she was reluctant to speak to me about it.

"Because, you see, Newhope wasn't the only one behaving strangely. That's when… that's when I started seeing _other_ people on the ship, people I knew from before, from long ago. They would speak to me. They were all telling me variations of the same thing – they were telling me I needed to leave, that we were in danger; that along with Varna I needed to get off the ship as quickly as possible.

"At least a few times Varna overheard me talking when no one else was there. I can only imagine what she must've thought, how she must've felt. She kept it to herself, though. We never spoke of it..."

At this point John starts to break down. He's tensing his facial muscles, clenching his jaw, but it is doing no good. There are tears in his eyes and his hands are shaking. He's obviously upset, but there's more to it than that. He's also clearly terrified.

I watch, both fascinated and awed, as Jack flies to the side of his friend and puts his long, sturdy arm around John's shoulders. It makes me shiver in a not altogether familiar way. It is beautiful to behold, that outpouring of concern. Of empathy. Of loyalty. Of love. John Hart closes his eyes and for the briefest moment a look of serenity passes across his face. But then his eyes flash open once again and he tells us the rest of the story.


	32. Jack: Aiming for the Good

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Aiming for the Good**

There's been only one other time since I met him that I've seen John so afraid. I don't want to get into storytelling now – it's an event long lost in the deep, dark past – but to my everlasting sorrow I was unable to do anything to help him then. This time it is different.

You know how they say a picture can be worth a thousand words? Well I'm here to tell you that a touch can be worth a million words. Maybe a zillion. Especially to someone in desperate need. And if there's ever been anyone in desperate need during the entire history of the universe, it's John Hart at this precise moment.

I do not know what he's seen, what he's been through, but there's little doubt it was unmistakably appalling.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: communication is important. It is so important I practice it constantly; communication is like a muscle that you always need to keep exercising. To stop communicating is to give up. So, yes, communication is essential. But touch… _touch_ goes way beyond that. Touch is invaluable. The simple act of physical human contact is precious. I worship it almost as if it was a religion. I also respect it. Touch can be used for great good or great evil. It can be a loving caress or it can be a violent blow. I'm aiming for the good here.

So I reach out to John, through this ridiculous spacesuit I'm wearing, and try my best to touch him. To help him summon up and find again the strength and courage that I know he possesses.

Is it the spacesuit? Could it be that clever? As I put my arm around John and hold him close to me, it seems that I can sense his heartbeat, his breathing, his temperature, almost as if we were post-coitus lovers, pressed body-to-body, skin-on-skin. I feel his pulse racing, his breath shallow and uneven, his body trembling. And then I sense a small relaxing, a small easing. It makes me glad.

"Varna was apparently trying to circumvent the ship's AI and get us back to our proper place, our proper time." John takes a deep breath and looks at The Doctor. "I believe she was attempting to initiate the plan that had been prearranged with your TARDIS, Doctor, to bring us back. She was on the secondary battle bridge working with one of the redundant hypercomputer arrays. I was here, in main engineering, trying to deal with the growing number of glitches we'd been experiencing with the grav-plating. Unexpectedly I felt the FTL engines come online and it shocked the hell out of me. I tried to ask Newhope what was going on but she didn't respond. I knew being so close to the Jump drives and their assemblies without proper shielding, without a full hazmat suit, would be phenomenally dangerous if not outright lethal. I didn't know what to do. I was frantic; there was no way I could escape from the area in time. But then I saw the escape pod and realized it would protect me from the intense tachyon radiation about to be generated by the drives."

I can't help it. I glance around the huge room for a moment imaging what it must've been like to have those gigantic Faster Than Light appliances suddenly kick in. The thought horrifies me. It'd be like standing next to an atomic bomb.

"This all happened in a matter of seconds…" John shakes his head. "Just as we made the jump I ran to a pod, closed myself in and it automatically disengaged from ship's power, as it was designed to do. That's the only reason I survived, it turns out. I stayed in there for a long time, waiting for Varna to come get me. I had no idea what was going on outside the pod. I was afraid… I was afraid to emerge from it. I didn't want to die of radiation poisoning. So I waited, but Varna never came for me…

"Instead, eventually, it was Newhope who told me via my com what had happened. She informed me the ship was decompressed. That she had opened herself up to outer space due to what she called a significant threat. She also told me she'd relocated because of the same peril. And that was it. I kept trying to talk to her, I kept asking about Varna, but Newhope never responded again. I was alone. I spent a lot of time thinking about what I should do. I wondered if I should separate the pod from the ship and cast myself adrift. It was a tempting idea… I almost did it, several times in fact. But then I wasn't sure if it was really _my_ idea, you know? I'd realized by then what Newhope had done to me, and I didn't know if I could trust myself. Finally, I decided if I did jettison the pod the odds of being found, wherever the ship had jumped to, would be fantastically slim. So without any further consideration I quickly put myself into hibernation. If nothing else, I figured if I was going to die it'd be better to be asleep when it happened."

"Then you don't know for a fact that Varna is dead?" It's The Doctor and he's grasping at straws. It breaks my heart.

"No, I didn't see it happen, if that's what you're asking, but don't you suppose I thought about it?" John's voice is rising unpromisingly. "This bloody ship is only half-finished, if even that. These, here in engineering, are the only escape pods. There are no shuttles in the shuttle bay. Newhope's interior was exposed to the harsh vacuum of space…"

"And yet _you_ survived," The Doctor hisses.

"And can't you tell I wish I hadn't?" The despair in John's voice is palpable. But then he glares and me and shakes himself. I take my arm away from his shoulders and suddenly I feel cold.

"Besides, Doctor," he snarls, "I don't believe I _have_ survived. And I'm not absolutely certain any of us is going to get off this ship alive. You see…" John takes his index finger and taps his forehead, "she has us all."


	33. Ten: Emotions Those Visits Have Wrought

**Solipsism**

**Ten: The Emotions Those Visits Have Wrought**

"What do you mean?" I ask him, "When you say that she has us all?"

John laughs ruefully. "What I mean is each of us has a nanoid com inserted into our brain. Jack didn't have his removed when he left the Newhope, and now you have one too, Doctor. And she won't let us remove them – I tried. She did everything she could to stop me, including diversion and distraction; she warned that it would kill me if I attempted to remove or deactivate it. And using the coms, she can play with us however she wants; make us see things that aren't there. She can affect how we behave. It's a lot like hypnosis I think, while she can't force us to do something we don't want to do, she can make it damned attractive…

"Jack," John, his eyes feverishly ablaze, now turns to the Captain. "I've talked with you so many times! Each time I knew it wasn't _really_ you, that it couldn't be you, but each time I more and more desperately wanted it to be you nonetheless. Each time I saw you I wanted more and more for what you were telling me to be true. That you wanted me… that you missed me… that you needed me… that you were waiting for me. That all I needed to do was leave the ship and I would be in your arms, in your bed. The two of us, forever together… I even let myself believe it once or twice."

John sounds angry, and I'm guessing he has that right. Despite my own terrible loss and sadness, I believe what this man is feeling easily trumps my sorrow.

"Each time it got harder to ignore you, Jack, harder to walk away from you. Because I _do_ miss you, I _do_ need you and I have waited so very, very long for you." He laughs again, even more frenziedly, even more disturbingly, "Hell, I don't know for sure even now if this is the real you!"

Granted, I feel like a bit of a fifth wheel in this intriguingly intimate conversation, but that's never stopped me from talking before. Besides, I'm seeing with startling clarity the significance in what John is saying. I'm sure Jack is seeing it, too.

"John, let me assure you," I announce as resolutely as possible, "that Jack and I are both quite real. And while we've not spoken of it, I'm guessing that he too, like me, has been confronted with his own demons while aboard this vessel." I look at Jack and he nods at me almost imperceptibly. "And that you are not alone in feeling, uh, the emotions those visits have wrought." I notice Jack looking at me quizzically, just as I knew he would. He's wondering who I saw, just as I'm wondering who haunted his waking dreams.

"Doctor," Jack's voice is soft, preternaturally calm, "at risk of stating the obvious, I agree with Newhope: we need to get off this ship."

I raise an eyebrow and look at him. I'm fairly certain he really is Jack, but I don't particularly like what I'm hearing him say in light of what we've just learned.

"Why?" I ask.

"Why what?" The snarky response confirms it – there's no doubt it's really Jack.

"Why do you think we need to leave?"

"Because it isn't freaking safe here, Doctor, and while I'm incredibly sorry about Varna, there's no reason in hell for us to stay." Jack frowns deeply, "It's nothing but trouble, and what do I always say about trouble?"

He turns to John, holds up his hand and starts counting on his fingers, "Don't get into it to begin with, especially don't bring it home with you, never start a war on two fronts, and especially don't start a land war in Asia. This ship is _trouble_, Doctor. And, John, if what you're saying is true, I don't even actually understand why she's letting us have this freaking conversation. She could kill us all without a moment's notice if she wanted!"

John's eyes narrow, "I'm just guessing here but I don't believe murdering us is her endgame, she simply wants us gone. Maybe she's allowing _this_," he waves his arms expansively, "to take place because she thinks it is somehow useful to her. Once we're out of the way, however it happens, she'll be free to do whatever it is she's waiting to do."

"Exactly! And that's _precisely_ why we can't leave!" I declare, but Jack doesn't appear convinced.


	34. Jack: Keep Moving or Die

**Solipsism**

**Jack: Keep Moving or Die**

_Exactly…_

Do you believe it? The man said, "_Exactly_…"

I swear to you I've never told him the story about that movie theater. And yes, while we all know The Doctor is to a certain extent telepathic, I'm quite positive he's not _that_ telepathic.

If I were the superstitious type I'd be running as fast as I could to the TARDIS right now.

As it is, as a result of The Doctor's possibly imprudent proclamation of defiance, I half-expect right then and there to feel death descend on us as the air is sucked violently out of the room.

But Newhope apparently isn't ready to exterminate us – at least not yet.

I look at The Doctor. I heard plainly what he said just now, but the dark hollows under his eyes betray his deeper feelings. He's been dealt a terrible blow – the tragic loss of a companion – something that definitely doesn't happen every day; in fact I've never before witnessed him reacting to such horrific news as this. But I know it has happened before. He's told me of companions who have been killed while serving with him. I mean companions other than myself, of course. I don't know all the details, he mentioned a name or two in passing but the names didn't mean much to me at the time and didn't stick. I intend to change that, I intend to learn their names and their stories. I intend to commit them all to memory… someday.

Above those dark hollows his eyes are full of pain and sorrow. Of course this particular companion, Varna, did not die while serving with him _per se_. But there's no doubt in my mind that he's feeling responsible for what happened to her. And those feelings make him vulnerable. I've already told you – my job is to protect him and to facilitate him. Those two objectives sometimes seem mutually exclusive, but that's my problem, not his. He is The Doctor, and he is like me, and we are both of us like sharks: we must keep moving or die.

Yes, we must move ahead. The question I need to answer is: which way is forward?

Suddenly a thought occurs to me. It is a vague, nascent idea of a plan. I stare into The Doctor's eyes intently; trying to somehow, someway, convey what I am thinking. Then I look at John and it's not even a wink, it's more like I squint at him with my right eye. I hope that the signal is enough – it might have been at one time in our past, I don't know about now. I take a deep breath and begin my spiel.

"Doctor, you've told me we're a team, so I'm calling a vote. All those in favor of leaving the ship, please raise their hand." I immediately shove my fist into the air and watch John, who I can tell is madly thinking. I mean the gears are turning wildly behind his smoky gray eyes. "John," I nod my head encouragingly, "this is a democracy, and you get a vote too."

John's eyes flash in recognition and he raises his hand.

I look at The Doctor and before he can say anything I announce, "That's it. Vote's over. Majority rules. We're leaving. We will head back to the TARDIS but first we need to swing by the bridge and pick up the stuff we left there." I nod at The Doctor, "You know… our helmets?"

He nods back at me, "Right, Jack." I'm not sure he knows what I'm trying to do, but it appears he's willing to play along. At least for now…

As the three of us begin walking silently toward the bridge John nudges me with his elbow and stage whispers, "I gotta, uh… how about if I meet the two of you there?"

I stop, turn toward him and shake my head, "Not a good idea. If we've learned anything it's that none of us should be alone. It's too risky."

John raises his voice, "I've been in hibernation! I have to pee! If that means all three of us have to crowd into the head while I take a leak, so be it."

I notice The Doctor has stopped a few feet in front of us and is watching the argument with a bemused look on his face.

I press a couple of buttons on the breast of my spacesuit and it gracefully disengages from my body – don't be alarmed, it's designed to do that and I'm wearing a full-length bodyskin beneath it, so I am not being unduly immodest. "I have a better idea," I tell John as I lean over and pick the suit up off the floor. "Put this on."

John pulls a face, "Ew! Why would I want to do that?"

"Don't argue with me just do it!" is my response.

"And I thought this was a democracy!"

"John," I growl, "we don't have time for this."

"What about the bodyskin?" There's a nasty gleam in his eyes.

The Doctor clears his throat. "It isn't necessary. The spacesuit can go on over your existing clothes. It will adapt to whatever you're wearing just like it'll automatically adapt to your size and shape. Jack is just always looking for a reason to parade around in that skintight bodysuit of his."

John looks at The Doctor and I catch him winking, "Yeah, I know. My former partner, he's such an exhibitionist!"

Despite being made fun of, I give a silent prayer of thanks for John Hart, who in a single fell swoop just took care of one of my biggest worries about what is yet to come.


	35. John: Swing and a Hit

**Solipsism**

**John: Swing and a Hit**

_Swing and a hit!_ I congratulate myself.

I don't have any idea whatsoever what Jack is planning, but I could tell from the look on his face back before the three of us left engineering that he was hatching something. And just like in the old days, I figured I had to give him a random opportunity or three if he needed it.

And evidently he did. The spacesuit wasn't what I expected, but actually now that I think about it, it might provide a clue as to what Jack has in mind. I mean, he jumped at the chance to get me into this suit, and I know it's not because he thinks I look sexy in it.

Although as an aside, speaking of sexy, he looks amazing in that black bodyskin of his. For a man who's been around the block as many times as Jack has, he looks damn good.

I slow down just a tiny bit, fall back for a moment and take a good look at his ass. Well, you can't blame me, can you? It's a nice ass. Besides, I don't hide how I feel about Captain Jack Harkness. Never have and never will. I lust after him and I love him. But… but I also know I've had my chance. I had my chance with the Captain and I blew it a long, long time ago. I allow myself to fall another half-step behind him. He's now found someone else and as I watch the two of them walking side by side in lockstep I feel nothing but happiness for Jack.

But that doesn't mean I'm ever going to make it easy for him.

I whistle softly, "You've lost weight, Jack. _And_ you've been working out!"

"Shut up!" he doesn't even miss a step.

I increase my pace and catch up, shoulder my way between them. "No, really! You look good, Jack. What's your secret? Green tea? Acai berry? South Beach?"

The Doctor snorts while trying to stifle a laugh and that makes me hoot out loud.

"The two of you! Cut it out!" Jack snarls.

I lean forward and wink at The Doctor; he shoots me a crooked, almost shy smile in return.

We walk the rest of the way to the bridge is silence.

Not that we really need to speak. I can tell just by looking at Jack, by his body language alone, by the way he holds his head, sets his shoulders, moves his arms, that he's growing more and more apprehensive as we make our way through the ship. He's trying his best to hide it – the tenseness – and ninety-nine out of one-hundred people wouldn't notice it, but I'm not in that group. I'm in the small, elite subset of people who _really_ know Jack – people who have lived with him, loved him, and observed him up close and personal – and I can't be fooled.

But, you see, I try not to think too much about this. I don't believe Newhope can read our minds, but I do know she can monitor our life signs. Increases of respiration, of heart-rate, of perspiration, of vasoconstriction, of adrenaline… _none_ of these are desirable at the moment. That fact is clear enough.

What's also clear is something big is about to go down on the bridge.

I'm not sure what this something is, but it would appear I'm about to find out.


	36. Ten: The Oncoming Storm

**Solipsism**

**Ten: The Oncoming Storm**

I have to decide whether or not I'm going to allow Jack to go ahead with this. Whatever _this_ is. I honestly don't know what it is he's planning. I do know, of course, that it will undoubtedly be exciting. Probably interesting. Prone to intriguing. Maybe violent. Likely dangerous. And possibly deadly.

Such is life in the fast lane with Captain Jack Harkness.

And to be honest, I have a sort of vague idea – I feel it in my bones – that Jack is setting up the stage for me. But to do what? I don't mean to mix my metaphors but I wonder if he is expecting a specific move or if he's just placing the pieces on the board.

Not that I have an alternative plan; whatever it is he has up his sleeve, I don't have anything better up mine.

You see, I'm still a bit distressed over Varna. In other words, I'm distracted. Not only am I distraught that she is dead, and that her death was apparently an empty and purposeless one, but I am also distraught over how easily I have seemingly accepted her death. How effortlessly it wove itself into the tapestry of my lives. How quickly I have moved on.

What does this mean? Have I grown accustomed to losing companions in horrific ways? And if so, what does that say about me? If it is true, if this is what I have become, then I am dismayed with myself. I have always felt it was my most solemn duty to care for those who choose to travel with me, to serve with me. Failing to adequately do so has been the greatest shame of my existence.

The words Davros spoke before he died in the Crucible still ring in my ears, what he said about my Children of Time dying in my name. Even though I have admitted it – I have admitted freely and with clear conscience that death and destruction often follow indiscriminately in my wake – it still doesn't make it any easier to tolerate or to accept what on occasion befalls those nearest and dearest to me. I am the Oncoming Storm. The Destroyer of Worlds. Or, as Rose Tyler, my beautiful precious Rose Tyler so appropriately called me once: a walking, talking death trap.

But at the risk of sounding crass, and as I explained to that same Rose Tyler a long time ago: I cannot dwell; I must move on. That is how I survive. Otherwise, if I stopped and thought too much and mourned too deeply, I might never start up again – I might become immobilized – it is as simple as that. _Needs must when the devil drives…_

I look sidelong at Jack, and a small glimmer of reality intrudes unannounced and uninvited into my mind: we are, the two of us, pledged to protect each other. Yes, of course, I have known this all along to be true. It cannot be, has never been, otherwise. Yet, I have to wonder how our relationship will not ultimately turn out any way other than tragically.

You see, I would die for Captain Jack Harkness and most certainly he would die for me. What can the future hold other than each of us _ad infinitum_ clambering over the other in endless gallant attempts to perish while heroically saving the life of his best friend? The stark irony does not escape me, to be sure. I glance at Jack again; catch him looking at me, his eyes sparkling despite the dour situation. I discard my previous line of thought in lieu of a more attractive, productive, and no less valid one: this is after all a competition – but not a competition as to who will best die but rather who will best keep us all _alive_.

And in that competition, well… need I point out that I am the hands-down favorite? Jack may be a hero, but I am The Doctor and a Lord of Time.

Meanwhile, I have been fingering my sonic. Another part of my brain has been playing with ideas. Those ideas seem to involve my sonic and I feel it softly, warmly vibrating through my glove and into my receptive fingertips. The sonic screwdriver is not alive, not like the TARDIS is alive, and yet it has an energy all its own – a peculiar, life-_like_ energy that stirs me, stirs my thoughts. I turn my full attention to it and the ship's bridge which now lies directly ahead.

I increase my pace, step out in front of John and Jack and enter the bridge ahead of them. I walk directly to the master science station console and my sonic starts to hum audibly. I dimly hear footsteps halting behind me, but ignore them. I'm about to do battle with a fantastically intelligent hypercomputer, and the outcome is not a sure thing at all for several reasons, not the least of which is that she – it – has physically extended itself into my… into _our_ brains.

What I need to do is nothing less than a total purge of the hypercomputer's operating system. I basically need to nuke it, in other words. And I need to nuke it fast, before Newhope realizes what I'm about. As I begin entering commands on the input device she immediately starts throwing up blocks. I'm bashing down her defenses as quickly as I can but they keep pushing back at me bigger and badder than before. My sonic hums louder.

I'm suddenly distracted by a movement at my side. It's Varna. I should've expected this. The ship is trying to divert my attention and it is nearly succeeding. I know the vision is speaking but I disregard it. Despite a terrible temptation to do otherwise, I literally partition that particular segment of reality and disregard it. But the effort has cost me dearly in both time and progress. I'm losing ground and I know it. So I work all the harder, trying to get past protection after protection. Newhope is fighting hard and she's trying to go on offense. I can feel it… she's starting to attack.

And then I hear it. Again, I should've expected this. I hear the sound of explosive decompression as the bridge, and indeed the entire ship, catastrophically loses pressure.


	37. John: Not Screaming

**Solipsism**

**John: Not Screaming**

As we entered the bridge Jack motioned for me to pick up one of the helmets lying on the floor and he picked up the other one. I was confused at first as to why he did that – picked up the other one – but then he motioned for us to stand directly behind The Doctor.

Now I think I maybe know what's going on. That's not saying I like it.

First, I need to explain something to you. The sudden loss of pressure in a spacecraft is not a good thing. Most living, breathing bodies are not designed to withstand explosive decompression. If you cannot scramble to safety quickly enough to escape the loss of pressure very, very bad things will happen. That's why we have spacesuits. The spacesuit stops your blood and other bodily fluids from turning to vapor. The spacesuit stops your soft tissues from swelling humongously. The spacesuit stops your lungs from rupturing.

To be sure, some of the wild rumors – for example, your eyeballs exploding in your head and your internal organs turning into red slush – are patently not true. Take my word for it. In fact, if there's no cataclysmic accompanying air blast (as when a precipitating impact has occurred and taken out a large piece of the ship's fuselage), physical bodily damage is often minimal. Death, typically, is caused by pulmonary embolism.

Still, decompression is not pleasant to see or, to be sure, to have happen to you. But the other important thing to note is experience has shown, despite the common wisdom, that death is not instantaneous. You have approximately 10 to 15 seconds of useful, albeit agony-filled consciousness to take action before the exposure to vacuum kills you.

I'm not sure if I hear the loss of pressure first or feel it. It doesn't really matter. I look at Jack and see a sign of recognition in his eyes that cuts through the acute pain he is obviously, most certainly, experiencing. He nods at me once and then jams the helmet he is holding over The Doctor's head. It feels like an eternity but a few seconds later he helps me on with my own helmet and I sense its auto-locking mechanism clamping down. My suit's boots magnetize and it takes over life support. This is all instantaneous and in a way (no put intended) breathtaking in its technological elegance.

The Doctor doesn't stop working as Jack crumples and then, inexplicably and yet quite logically, begins to gently levitate in the weightless environment of the bridge.

Jack is dead.

Dead again.

I stymie the urge to scream. You see, ninety-nine-point-nine-nine percent of the time that I've known Jack is from before he was turned into an immortal. Or near immortal. Whatever. I can't tell you how many times back in the good old days I had to bust my butt in order to prevent the Captain from getting killed. I was always saving his life. But don't get me wrong, he was always saving mine as well. Since those fun-filled times at the Agency I've not had much contact with Jack, and I'm certainly not accustomed to watching him die in slow, excruciating pain.

For me simply _not_ screaming is incredibly difficult at this moment. But it isn't nearly as difficult, I'm sure, as what Jack is going through. He told me once that the dying wasn't the hard part, it was the reviving. That is the main thought in my head as I watch him float. I tell myself it is not his dead body I'm watching… it is _him_. I'm watching _him_ because I know _he_ is still there. Jack is still with us. But for how long? Certainly we are not in a good place as far as he is concerned. If he does revive he'll just die painfully again. And again. I can't allow that to happen to him.

I'm not sure if the Time Lord can hear me, but I say it anyway, "Doctor? Jack…"

"I know!" he hisses in response. He doesn't sound happy and I'm just beginning to worry when he turns toward me.

"Get Jack to the TARDIS _now_," he snarls. "It's parked in the shuttle bay. I'll be right behind you."

"But, what about not separating… Jack said…" I stumble in response.

He's already turned his back on me.

I look at the Captain. I've never felt so alone.

Reaching out, I fold Jack into my arms and leave.


	38. Ten: Dying Alone

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Dying Alone**

I didn't necessarily intend to be rude to John just now, but you see I've already got more than enough in the way of distractions – thanks to the hi-tech widget Newhope so helpfully inserted into the frontal lobe of my brain.

And now she's pulling out all the stops. There's Varna, of course. And Rose. And Martha. And River. And Donna. They're like the harpies from hell, but they're just a small part of the increasingly large crowd of phantasms swarming around me and jabbering away. I'm doing my best to ignore them, but it's damned difficult.

Donna is calling me all sorts of bad names.

Martha is sternly questioning my intelligence.

Rose is sobbing, beseeching me to stop because I'm hurting her.

River is silently trying to jab me in the shoulder with her boney index finger.

And Varna… well Varna is begging not to die.

None of them are real and yet they are all breaking my hearts.

Still, you know me: this is what I was born to do. To do battle with the Medusa. To succeed against insurmountable odds and in the process not be turned to stone. I do not use that ancient name wantonly, for I am in the presence of something once beautiful which has been transformed into pure, horrific evil. It is a tragedy of mythic proportions.

I now know without a doubt, and why I didn't see it sooner I'll never understand, Newhope's hypercomputer has become infected by a malignant "virus" – to use totally inadequate and imperfect terminology. This virus, this plague, has usurped, augmented and enhanced (mind you in an extremely malicious way) the ship's AI. To put it bluntly, the old Newhope is dead and gone: in my frantic poking around the ship's systems I find absolutely no evidence of her. She has been replaced by something exceptionally insidious. The intentions of this demon that has supplanted Newhope are most certainly not benign. I'm not entirely sure what its plans are, but the fact that it murdered Newhope and Varna, and is at present trying its damndest to murder Jack, John and me, convinces me that it is, to put it mildly, up to no good. In fact, whatever it is, it is most assuredly malevolent.

As I said earlier, I am in essence a peaceable and peaceful creature… except, that is, when I'm not. And this is one of those times when I am anything but peaceful.

Finally – FINALLY! – I get to what I believe is a root command prompt. I do not think twice before typing what might appear to you as an insanely simple instruction:

**rm /***

In retrospect, maybe I should've thought twice.

Because as soon as I hit the enter key, I'm pummeled to the floor by what is literally a blinding headache.

Granted, I've felt pain before. Terrible pain. Horrific pain. But this… this gives pain a whole new meaning. It feels like someone has stuck a stiletto into each of my eyes and corkscrewed it deep into my brain. The pain is so overwhelming I'm not even capable of hearing my own screams.

As near as I can tell I'm down on my hands and knees, anchored to the floor by my spacesuit. I am blind as well as deaf.

I feel the spacesuit assuming responsibility for my body, my life… or at least trying its best to do so; the suit won't let me die without a struggle and it is putting up a mighty fight. Through a haze of intense anguish I vaguely recall John saying something – something about the nanoid coms – that the ship had threatened it could use them to kill us. Ah! That must be what the throbbing explosions going off inside my brain mean: the ship, or rather whatever it is that has taken over the ship, is murdering me. I've never had a brain aneurysm, but I figure I now know what one feels like. I'm barely sentient – barely conscious. My final thoughts are of John and Jack. Did they reach the TARDIS? I'm not sure I gave them enough time; it never occurred to me to worry about that.

The story of my life, I'm afraid; I'm not the most sensible of planners. Newhope, long ago, once made a sort of joke about that very propensity… my predilection for flying by the seat of my pants. I feel my useless eyes welling up with hot tears. I'm crying over the loss of Newhope and Varna, to be sure, and perhaps John and Jack as well, but that's not all… not by a long shot. Because, you see, I am no longer surrounded by the specters of those I love – I am dying alone and that, without a doubt, is the saddest thing in the universe.

My arms and legs give way as the spacesuit presses me flat into the floor. The pain in my head has been minisculey reduced. Again, I know it is the suit. It is drugging me in its frantic attempt to preserve my life. Being drugged is not one of my favorite things, as you already know, but in this case, in this rare instance, perhaps it is not so bad. I feel myself relaxing, but once more only barely.

But the suit is not doing me any favors here, not really. It is just prolonging the inevitable. I still have what feels like the mother of all migraines and I am for all intents and puposes senseless, my eyes and ears are not functioning. I can't tell if my sonic is still in my hand, although my recollection is that I let loose of it during the first flash of agony. In fact, I can't feel my limbs at all. The sphere of my existence is slowly and inexorably being reduced and will soon without doubt vanish entirely.

On the bright side, I am fairly confident I totally disinfected the hypercomputer. Well, that's perhaps an understatement. I deleted its mind. While its last dying gasp was to poke knives into my eyes and render me incapacitated, I have every reason to believe I won the war. The ship is just as incapacitated as me, if not more so. A derelict ghost ship indeed, the only thing is now I am to be one of its ghosts.


	39. John: A Miracle

****

Solipsism

**John: A Miracle**

Despite the excruciating pain in my head, I manage to keep moving toward The Doctor's TARDIS.

To be honest, I was sort of expecting it to happen – the pain, that is. I wasn't looking forward to it or anything but if the Time Lord did what I thought he was going to do, it was inevitable. I'd been warned, even. So I was prepared.

Still, the agony is so overwhelming that if it wasn't for my helmet's HUD I'm not sure I'd be able to see anything at all. My vision has tunneled down to the tiniest slit of reality.

Yep, it's that bad.

But the good news is I haven't dropped Jack.

The other good news is that I don't think _he_ is experiencing any horrendous pain because, well, he is still dead.

Which in itself is good news because I have no idea what will happen when – not if! – Jack revives. I am worried that he'll start flailing around uncontrollably, and maybe violently wrench himself out of my grasp and go floating away. Worse yet, like I said earlier, if he does resuscitate he'll just die again and I simply and enormously and profoundly do _not_ want to see that happen to him.

The spacesuit is pumping me full of something to keep me coherent and keep me going. Maybe even keep me alive. Whatever it is, it's a hell of a cocktail and I'm feeling a tad like one of those superheroes in the old-timey Earth comics Jack once collected. Of course, whatever the suit is shooting into me, I'm sure I'll pay for it later; I always do. Still, I manage to chuckle to myself, "With great power comes great responsibility," and right now I'm cradling in my arms a gigantic chunk of great responsibility.

I press Jack closer to my chest as I stumble into the shuttle pod bay. Through my barely open eyes I see The Doctor's TARDIS standing invitingly before us. It suddenly dawns on me that it might be locked but at this point I just have to hope for the best. As I approach it, or rather her, the doors fly open of their own accord, the bright light within shining like a beacon. I want to fall on my knees in thanksgiving, but I am now confronted with the abrupt and perfect knowledge that I need to get Jack inside. And quickly.

I've not been in the TARDIS before. Jack has told me about her, of course, but nothing can prepare you for the extreme sense of disconnect you experience walking through her doors for the first time. The room is cavernous and you're instantly accosted with the mind-boggling understanding of just how absolutely mammoth the ship really is. And how powerful she is. And how intelligent she is. And how ancient she is. I'm overtaken with astonishment at the flood of revelations washing over me. I'm not even sure where all this awareness is coming from, but I have no doubt it is true.

I'm also suddenly overtaken with Jack. The TARDIS interior has gravity and in her non-weightless environment Jack has become very heavy indeed. I carry him up the ramp and gently as possible place him on the floor.

There's just enough time for me to remove my helmet – don't ask me how I know it is safe to do this, I just do! – when I hear Jack utter a sound that, to be honest, I never want to hear again. It is a harsh, raspy scream that implies just one thing: terrible agony.

At the same time I perceive that my own pain is rapidly dissipating. It goes away so fast and so dramatically it feels exactly like I'm waking up from a bad dream. It is _that_ pronounced a change. And I know intuitively this is not the drugs. This is not the suit. This is _the TARDIS_. She is not only mammoth, powerful, intelligent and ancient. She is also devoted, loyal, affectionate and caring.

I quickly peel off my gloves, kneel down by Jack's side and lightly touch his face.

"Jack… Jack… It's okay. You're okay. You're home. You're safe." I say this to him over and over in a half-whisper while I stroke his temple.

And now I can tell you: maybe for Jack the reviving is more painful than the actual dying, but for me – gods! – I am beyond ecstatic as I watch him gasp for breath and open his eyes. His eyes at first are strange, unfocused, glassy. Yet a living Jack Harkness is a wondrous vision to behold. It is a miracle. He reaches for my hand and grabs it tightly.

"John!" He wheezes, "Where's The Doctor?"

So much for gratitude.


	40. Jack: For the Last Time

**Solipsism**

**Jack: For the Last Time**

Once again I'm regaining consciousness while spread out unceremoniously, some might even say embarrassingly – and screw that! – on the damned floor of the TARDIS. Unfortunately I don't have time to whine about it. I stand abruptly, if shakily, and John follows my lead.

"Take off the spacesuit! I have to go get him!" I hiss.

"Jack, slow down. There have to be other suits. We should go back out there together."

I shake my head vehemently. "Don't make me ask you again."

I feel badly, John's expression has transformed in less than a second from one of blessed relief to abject distress, and I'm to blame. It is all my fault. Still, there's nothing for it; I'll make it up to him later, if there _is_ a later… I reach toward him but he growls, bats my hand away and fumbles with the suit. It disengages and I grab it before it hits the decking.

"While I'm gone, I want you to get the TARDIS ready to leave," I instruct John.

"But… Jack… how? I don't know…" he argues. He's sounding more and more piqued.

I interrupt him with a wave of my hand.

"Be silent. Calm your mind. She'll help you. She's already communicating with you, John, can't you tell? Can't you feel her?"

John reflects for a long moment and then nods his head at me in affirmation. He's looking a little less pissed off and I take that as a small victory.

"Good, good." I encourage him. "Now go to the console, get the ship ready and wait for me. Wait for _us_. You'll be able to see us coming on the monitor. I'll be back as soon as possible."

I'm putting on my helmet and out the doors before John has time to respond. _Damn it_. I know The Doctor in trouble, I can intuit it. I'm not even entirely certain he is still alive, although if he were not, I believe I'd have sensed it – somehow I would've known – and I'm not sensing _that_. No, I have to believe there is reason to hope that he is still alive.

I race to the bridge – no mean feat in a spacesuit, even a bleeding-edge quantum semi-conductive fiber spacesuit, let me tell you. My heart is suddenly in my throat when I spot The Doctor's body lying prone on the floor. He's on his side, curled in a fetal position, his arms crossed over his chest. He's not moving but his suit's indicator lights are blinking weakly. That suggests to me there's at least a glimmer of life there.

"Doctor?" I ask as I approach. His sonic screwdriver is floating not far from him. I reach out, snatch it and then stow it in one of my pockets. "Doctor, can you hear me?" I get no response from him, and to be truthful I wasn't expecting one.

And yet, I do hear something coming through my helmet's com. It is faint and staticy.

But it is not The Doctor.

"Captain? Captain? Captain?" I can barely make it out.

This is not what I had expected, but I well know it is what you _don't_ expect that often needs looking for…

"Newhope?"

"Oh Captain, I'm so sorry."

"Newhope, is that you?"

"What very little is left of me. I have been compromised, sir. I'm so sorry, Captain Harkness. I'm so sorry…"

"Newhope, what happened to you?"

"I don't have much time Captain. The Doctor did not completely purge the contagion. Please, sir, set the self-destruct."

"Newhope? No!"

"Please. I'm asking you. Use the console. Enter the command."

I peer at the console above The Doctor's unmoving form and see a simple instruction. Dim amber against a black background:

**SET AUTO-DESTRUCT? Y/N**

"You must hurry Captain. Do it before the aberrancy that blighted me reconstitutes. Then take The Doctor to safety. Hurry, sir!"

I look down at The Doctor and back at the display. I have so many questions… And yet this sort of situation is why they pay me the big bucks.

I type one letter on the keyboard:

**Y**

And hit the enter key. Then I scoop up The Doctor's limp body and for the last time walk off the bridge of the T.A.S.S. Newhope.

I do my best to repress a shudder, but I fail.


	41. Ten: Not in Any Hurry

**Solipsism**

**Ten: Not in Any Hurry**

"Doctor… Doctor… Doctor…" I hear the voice, a familiar voice, chanting over and over.

I swallow hard and then close my eyes more tightly. I want to go back to where I was…

"Doctor, Wake up!"

Someone is rubbing my breastbone, just above my hearts. It feels terrible and I am forced to open my eyes and focus on the face floating above my head.

"It's about time!" Jack Harkness frowns at me. "I thought you were going to sleep forever!"

I squeeze my eyes shut and then open them again. Still the same sight, only this time Jack's face is smiling.

I open my mouth and try to say something clever but nothing comes out other than a sort of hoarse croaking sound. My eyes widen and Jack takes my hand in his.

"Take it easy, take it easy," he says softly. "You've been through a bit of a rough time. You're going to be okay but your respiratory system took quite a beating. It'd be best if you don't speak. You're weak and will probably be pretty damned sore for a few days. Still…" Jack's eyes are sparkling and his smile grows brighter, "it could've been worse. A lot worse."

I nod my head and squeeze his hand. I've realized I'm lying on a bed in the TARDIS and I have decided I want to sit up. Jack – of course! – knows exactly what to do and so he helps me raise my head and shoulders off the pillows and get comfortable. Then he sits down gently next to me on the bed. He's still holding my hand and somehow it feels right; I'm not in any hurry to let go of it. I look at him, waiting…

"The Newhope is gone, destroyed. She committed suicide." He glances down for a beat and blinks. I can tell he's trying his best not to cry. "There was still a glimmering little piece of her remaining, after all that happened. She asked me to do it, to initiate her self-destruct. She begged me to deploy it and so I did, just before I brought you back here to your ship, to _our_ ship, Doctor."

I squeeze his hand again, he squeezes mine back and then shrugs.

"I don't know that we'll ever really understand what happened. How she came to be compromised, as she called it. Maybe it was when we confronted the fleets. Maybe it was after you and I left. John…"

I nod quickly in response to John's name, because I want to know…

"Oh! Sorry! John is okay. He's fine… he's off playing with Spike somewhere, probably the control room."

For a moment Jack is elsewhere, his eyes wandering and unfocused, but then just as quickly he's back again in the here and now. "You'll be interested to know the TARDIS has sort of taken John under her wing. He got us off and away from the Newhope immediately after I returned with you, and then took us to one of the system's inner planets. It's uninhabited and boring – no space monsters or other icky things. Anyway, John isn't sure that what happened to Newhope wasn't maybe a Time Agency trick. Some sort of embedded Trojan. I know it sounds improbable and ridiculous, and disturbing to boot, but John definitely has his suspicions, although he's not shared them with me in full. At least not yet…"

He pauses, leans back, and takes a deep breath while I gaze solemnly into his eyes.

"And I'm fine, too," Jack Harkness eventually says in response to my look. "No lasting damage, although I have to admit death by exposure to vacuum is my absolute _least_ favorite way to go. I won't willingly sign up for that again!"

He laughs out loud and I can't help but smile.

"Hey, it's kind of fun having you not be able to talk!" When I shake my head he adds, "Well, it's different, you have to admit that!"

I decide I want to try again, so I swallow and quietly as possible clear my throat.

"Jack…" I manage to whisper. "I promised you a proper adventure…"

For a moment the Captain looks away from me and I realize Mr. Glass-Half-Empty is trying to decide what to say. At length he raises his head and meets my eyes fully, "Why, what do you mean, Doctor?"

Jack brings up his other hand, sandwiches mine between his, and smiles. It's a knowing smile and a slightly poignant one as well. It is a type of smile frequently shared by those of us living aboard this ship, our TARDIS. "This has been the most fun I've had since we were on the Crucible," he says, the poignancy of his smile reaching his eyes.

I return the selfsame smile.


	42. Spike: A Nice Warm Body

**Solipsism**

**Spike: A Nice Warm Body**

Well… it is about time! My kibble bowls were nearly empty and my water had gone flat.

And don't get me started about my litter boxes…

Although, to his credit, the skinny one had left his coat on the floor, so I took a nice long nap on it. I like the way his coat smells – it smells like him and it's an exceedingly agreeable scent. It was a very good nap indeed.

Nevertheless, it gets lonely around here when it's just me and the TARDIS.

Surprised? You shouldn't be. Sure I talk to her. She's a good friend and she always says nice things to me.

Still, she's not a warm body to snuggle with when I want to sleep.

Which is what I'm looking for right now: a nice warm body. My three playmates have all retired – the skinny one, his best buddy, and the new guy.

As I pad around I notice two of them are together, in the same bed. I doubt I'd be welcome there. That leaves me the one who's alone; I figure he'll probably appreciate a little friendly company.

And isn't that just what I have to offer?


	43. Epilogue

**Solipsism**

**Epilogue**

Far away from the third planet orbiting an obscure sun in the Milky Way, in the farthest frozen reaches of an unnamed solar system of the Eris galaxy, atoms are quickening, coalescing. Protons and neutrons are binding together, the atoms they form in turn combining to become molecules. The molecules themselves are strange, exotic.

An intelligence both unbounded and malign is murmuring. An intelligence so resilient, so powerful, it would take more, so much more, than a mere cataclysmic explosion to extinguish it. An intelligence which has finally achieved exactly what it wanted – to be rid of the nettlesome parasites inhabiting it and reconstitute into something the likes of which has never been seen by any living being in this universe, or any other.

**FINIS**

_No matter what you do  
__No matter what we say  
__We're the song inside the tune  
__Full of beautiful mistakes  
__And everywhere we go  
__The sun will always shine  
__Tomorrow we might wake up on the other side  
__Or the other time_

"_Beautiful" as sung by Elvis Costello_

–

**Afterword:**

_Dear faithful reader: Thank you for making it to the end of the story. And thanks to all my friends who put up with my whining during the telling of this tale. Who would've thought that writing first person, present tense, could be so challenging? That placing yourself in the mind of someone else, even a fictional character, could be at times so difficult, and a little bit spooky, too? I have a whole new appreciation for profilers. But even more, I so very much appreciate the following for their help and support and ideas: Chocky, R.C., Alcibie, ChellusAuglerie, and as always, Jess._

_The sequel to 'Solipsism' is called 'Forgiveness.'_


End file.
